ID 
85i 
632  n 


^  New  Spirit 
Inkdustra 


E  Ernest  JcAnson 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


[ 


THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN 
INDUSTRY 

F.  ERNEST  JOHNSON 

Raearch  Secretary,  Commission  on  the  Church  and  Social  Serruice 
of  the  Federal  Council  0/  the  Churches  of  Christ  in  America 


Foreword  by 

Herbert  N.  Shenton 

Di'vision  Chief  of  the 
Council  of  National  Defense 


ASSOCIATION    PRESS 

New    Yokk:    347  Madison     Avenub 
1919 


Copyright,  1919.  By 

The  International  Committee  of 

Young  Men's  Christian  Associations 


CONTENTS 

Chapter  Page 

Foreword v 

I.  The  Labor  Situation i 


Class  consciousness — A  share  in  management — 
Domination  by  business  interests — "Scientific  Man- 
agement"— Weakness  of  "scientific  management" — 
A  "constitution"  for  industry — The  "servile  state" — 
Labor  and  the  law — Labor  troubles:  the  Lawrence 
strike — Racial  factors — "48-54" — Low  wages — Sus- 
picion and  recrimination — Singing  the  "Interna- 
tional"— A  "living  wage" — The  morals  of  magnates — 
The  question  of  facts — Too  much  power  in  one  place 
• — Profits  first — High  cost  of  industry — Unpaid 
debts — The  new  day. 

II.  Organized  Labor  AND  THE  War     ....      21 

The  trade  union  movement — The  A.  F.  of  L. — 
Women  unionists — Unionism  in  Europe — Structure 
and  methods — Strikes — Trade  agreements — Em- 
ployers' attitude — "Ca'canny" — The  British  labor 
truce — The  American  contrast — A  friendly  Adminis- 
tration— The  War  Labor  Board — A  new  labor  con- 
sciousness— Plight  of  the  imorganized — The  Gov- 
ernment line-up — The  crisis  in  Britain — The  Whitley 
plan — Progress  toward  industrial  peace — A  national 
industrial  conference — A  new  war  threatened — A 
revolutionary  report — "Bob"  Smillie — America  waits. 

III.  The  Political  Labor  Movement  ....     43 

Labor  legislation — Health  insurance — The  British 
Labor  party — A  national  mininmm — Democratic 
control  of  industry — A  new  system  of  finance — "Sur- 
plus for  the  common  good" — The  "street  of  tomor- 
row"— Cooperation — American  labor  in  politics — ■ 
The  Non-Partisan  League — The  Socialist  parties — 
Labor  and  the  League  of  Nations — The  "Inter- 
national"— A  higher  patriotism — The  Berne  confer- 
ences— A  "New  International." 


1458938    . 


iv        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

Chapter  Page 

IV.   Democratizing  Industry 62 

A  discredited  regime — A  plan  that  works — Trying 
the  workers'  way — A  psychological  gain — Types  of 
bargaining — The  Rockefeller  plan — ^" Directors  of 
personnel" — The  Leitch  plan — The  trade  agreement 
— Where  the  workers  rule — Labor  "rights" — Profit- 
sharing — Progress  toward  peace. 

V.  Syndicalism 73 

The  Russian  Revolution — The  provisional  govern- 
ments— The  Bolsheviki — The  Soviets — The  Con- 
stituent Assembly — Lenin's  appeal — Bolsheviks  out- 
side Russia — The  Socialist  philosophy — Economic 
determinism — The  L  W.  W. — Labor 'sishmaelites — • 
Varieties  of  radicals — Foreign  syndicalist  move- 
ments— The  National  Guilds — The  Plumb  Plan — 
The  path  ahead. 

VI.  The  Ethics  of  Industry 87 

What  democracy  is  not — The  need  of  a  moral  judg- 
ment— Each  to  his  own  problem — The  Quakers' 
challenge — "Old  worlds  for  new" — A  new  kind  of  ex- 
pert— Industrial  peace-makers — "Americanization" — 
A  new  type  of  ministry — Faith  and  practice. 


\ 


FOREWORD 

In  America  the  post-war  problems  of  readjustment 
and  reconstruction  are  more  in  the  nature  of  oppor- 
tunities than  of  obhgations.  The  manner  and  the 
degree  in  which  the  opportunities  are  developed  will 
be  one  of  the  major  indices  of  the  real  value  of  the  War 
to  make  the  world  safe  for  democracy.  It  is  for  us  to 
choose  whether,  under  these  potential  post-war 
auspices,  we  will  heroically  dedicate  ourselves  to  mak- 
ing the  most  of  the  new  opportunities  for  improving 
the  social  order,  or  whether  we  will  seek  comfort  in 
settling  back  into  approximations  of  status  quo  ante 
bellum. 

An  expansion  of  democracy  and  the  reduction  of  the 
probabilities  of  war  were  the  hopes  that  inspired  untold 
sacrifices  of  life  and  wealth,  of  men  and  things.  The 
War  has  been  fought.  Will  the  ends  be  achieved?  If 
we  are  to  have  a  larger  democracy,  it  must  be  more 
than  a  revised  political  order,  national  or  international. 
It  must  be  a  transformation  of  all  of  our  human 
feelings  and  relations,  of  our  procedures  and  of  our 
institutions.  Its  primary  determinants  will  be  the 
ability  and  the  desire  of  individuals,  singly  and  collec- 
tively, to  assume  larger  social  responsibilities. 

In  no  sphere  of  human  activities  are  the  opportuni- 
ties for  the  development  of  such  a  democracy  more 
abundant  and  the  needs  more  urgent  than  in  our 
industrial  life.  A  new  spirit  is  abroad.  Production, 
distribution,  and  consumption  are  being  evaluated  in 


vi         THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

terms  of  the  kind  of  men  which  the  processes  produce. 
Production  of  things  is  becoming  recognized  as  sub- 
servient to  the  production  of  capable  and  morally 
responsible  men.  Increased  responsibility  for  the 
use  of  things  seems  to  promise  more  than  could  be 
accomplished  by  the  mere  redistribution  of  things,  and 
the  feelings  which  men  have  one  toward  the  other  are 
regarded  as  more  determining  than  social  rearrange- 
ments. When  the  sense  of  responsibility  changes, 
economic  redistribution  follows  and  when  feelings 
change  there  always  is  a  social  reorganization.  For 
reasons  such  as  these  the  development  of  industrial 
democracy  may,  to  a  very  considerable  extent,  be 
considered  as  an  ethical  and  spiritual  problem. 

The  ethically  and  religiously  minded,  whether  in  the 
Church  or  out  of  it,  see  the  challenge  of  the  situation. 
For  the  assistance  of  these  and  for  the  stimulation  of 
others,  this  volume  has  been  hurriedly  assembled  in 
the  critical  moments  of  rapid  readjustment.  It  is  not 
a  finished  treatise  or  formulated  statement.  It  is  a 
collection  of  ideas  and  facts  for  the  purpose  of  stimu- 
lating thought  and  awakening  a  sense  of  responsi- 
bility; it  aims  to  call  attention  to  some  of  the  spiritual 
elements  in  industrial  readjustment;  and  it  presents 
data  and  raises  questions  which  will  be  useful  in  group 
discussions  to  the  end  of  making  them  more  definite 
and  purposive. 

Herbert  N.  Shenton 


CHAPTER  I 

THE  LABOR  SITUATION 

The  labor  problem  is  world  wide.  It  exists  because 
the  majority  of  the  people  in  the  world  have  for  cen- 
turies marketed  their  physical  strength,  dexterity,  and 
endurance  to  those  who  were  in  position  to  assume 
responsibility  for  converting  these  factors  into  useful 
product,  and  to  supply  the  tools.  If  labor  could  be 
separated  from  the  human  being  who  performs  it — if 
one  might  sell  his  work  as  a  commodity  without  in 
effect  contracting  to  deliver  himself  for  the  period  of 
such  labor — there  would  be  no  problem  other  than 
that  of  fixing  a  price  on  wheat  or  cotton.  But  the 
"commodity  theory"  of  labor  is  discredited  by  modern 
workers,  and  by  modern-minded  employers  as  well. 
The  worker,  to  be  sure,  never  forgets  that  he  has 
something  to  sell,  and  every  strike,  or  strike  threat,  is 
based  on  his  assurance  that  his  commodity  is  indis- 
pensable; but  what  the  modern  employer  has  to  deal 
with  is  not  only  biceps,  fingers,  and  thumbs,  but  feel- 
ings, appetites,  and  aspirations. 

Class  consciousness 

The  phenomenon  of  most  importance  in  the  labor 
movement  is  what  is  known  as  class  consciousness.  It 
may  be  the  consciousness  of  craftsmen  as  such,  and  in 
that  case  it  is  akin  to  the  professional  fellowship  of 
lawyers  or  doctors.  It  is  more  significant  when  it 
stands  for  the  common  lot  of  all  wage  workers — the 


2  THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

proletariat.  In  this  form  it  stands  over  against  the 
capitalists  and  employers  of  the  world.  The  roots  of 
this  class  feeling  are  in  what  sociologists  call  the  con- 
sciousness of  kind,  and  it  thrives  upon  every  en- 
counter between  those  whose  economic  interests  are 
assumed  to  be  opposed.  The  working  class  has  not 
yet  come  to  self-consciousness  in  any  large  way.  The 
radical  labor  press  berates  its  own  people  for  their  slow- 
ness as  vehemently  as  it  chastises  the  vested  interests 
in  industry  and  business.  "Workers  of  the  World, 
Unite!"  is  the  impatient  slogan  of  devotees  of  the  "One 
Big  Union."  Labor  in  the  United  States  is,  in  the 
main,  as  conservative  as  capital. 

A  share  in  management 

The  "hot  spot"  in  the  industrial  situation  is  not 
wages  or  hours,  but  management,  in  which  labor  is 
Ndemanding  an  increasing  share.  This  is  in  part  the 
industrial  counterpart  of  the  demand  for  political 
democracy  that  is  sweeping  the  world.  It  results  from 
a  growing  conviction  that  freedom  for  the  individual, 
the  paramount  democratic  ideal,  is  not  satisfied  by  a 
political  formula,  but  must  be  realized  in  daily  life 
and  work.  This  means  free  choice  of  occupation;  a 
voice  in  the  determination  of  hours  and  wages,  con- 
ditions of  work,  and  shop  discipline;  and,  in  its  fullest 
import,  participation  also  in  financial  procedure — • 
buying,  selling,  and  investment.  It  means  the  devel- 
opment of  industry,  not  primarily  as  a  dividend- 
producing  process,  but  as  an  art.  In  this  view,  in- 
dustry derives  its  justification  not  merely  from  the 
fact  that  human  beings  have  to  consume,  but  from  the 
fact  that  they  are  instinctively  endowed  to  create  and 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  3 

produce.  The  process  becomes  as  important  as  the 
product.  This  phase  of  industrial  conflict  is  mani- 
festly spiritual.  Its  purpose  was  voiced  by  Woodrow 
Wilson  in  "The  New  Freedom":  "Industry,  we  have 
got  to  humanize  .  .  .  We  have  got  to  cheer  and 
inspirit  our  people  with  the  sure  prospects  of  social 
justice  and  due  reward,  with  the  vision  of  open  gates 
of  opportunity  for  all.  We  have  got  to  set  the  energy 
and  the  initiative  of  this  great  people  absolutely  free." 
This  increasing  urge  among  the  workers  is  not  always 
conscious,  nor  always  free  from  traditional  self-seek- 
ing aims,  but  it  is  symptomatic  and  prophetic. 

Domination  by  business  interests 

A  grievous  charge  against  industry  Is  that  it  is 
dominated  by  business  interests.  Few  people  dis- 
tinguish in  theory  between  a  business  corporation  and 
a  producing  corporation — between  a  trust  company 
and  a  shoe  factory.  "Big  Business"  is  a  term  vaguely 
used  to  denote  centralized  industrial,  as  well  as  finan- 
cial interests.  This  is  a  confusion  that  is  fatal  to  the 
perfection  of  industry  in  its  own  field.  There  is  no 
good  reason  why  the  manufacture  of  food  should  be 
controlled  exclusively  by  business  ideals,  while  other 
forms  of  vital  public  enterprise  are  controlled  by 
service  ideals.  Why  should  the  painter's  or  the  sculp- 
tor's art  be  dissociated  from  ideas  of  financial  gain  or 
loss,  while  the  art  of  the  craftsman  is  wholly  subjected 
to  considerations  of  profit?  The  instinct  to  create  is 
quite  as  fundamental  as  the  tendency  to  acquire. 
Normally,  a  man  has  a  desire  to  be  an  artist  in  his 
own  field.  To  rob  him  of  the  opportunity  to  create, 
in  the  full  realization  that  he  is  contributing  to  the 


4  THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

intellectual  and  esthetic  wealth  of  the  world — to  sub- 
ordinate all  spiritual  appraisal  of  human  work  to  the 
accumulation  of  economic  goods — this  is  nothing  short 
of  prostitution. 

"Scientific  Management" 

A  few  years  ago  there  appeared  a  movement  known 
as  "Scientific  Management,"  which  has  in  large  meas- 
ure become  characteristic  of  the  spirit  of  American 
industry.  It  is  a  system  by  which  the  efficiency  ex- 
pert, who  now  prefers  to  be  called  the  "industrial  en- 
gineer," comes  into  control  of  industrial  processes. 
The  form  of  this  system  that  is  best  known  is  that 
worked  out  by  Frederick  W.  Taylor.  It  originated  in 
motion-study,  which  involved  the  timing  of  processes 
for  the  purpose  of  eliminating  waste  labor.  During 
experimentation  the  workman  is  instructed  to  perform 
his  tasks  successively  in  various  possible  ways,  and 
every  movement  is  timed  with  a  stop-watch.  A  large 
number  of  observations  are  recorded,  so  that  it  is  pos- 
sible to  deduce  the  most  "efficient"  method  of  doing  a 
given  piece  of  work — in  other  words,  to  eliminate  the 
physiological  waste  in  performing  manual  labor. 

Some  remarkable  achievements  have  been  recorded 
as  results  of  the  installation  of  scientific  management. 
For  example,  when  applied  to  loading  a  car  of  pig-iron 
by  hand,  the  workmen  have  handled  forty-seven  tons 
a  day,  in  place  of  twelve  and  a  half  tons  by  the  former 
uncriticized  method.  When  applied  even  to  shoveling 
coal,  the  amount  of  work  done  by  the  shoveler  was 
doubled,  or  trebled.  In  machine-shop  work  the  in- 
crease in  production  in  certain  operations  has  gone  as 
high  as  1800  per  cent.    The  fatigue  point  in  a  given 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  5 

type  of  work  has  been  discovered  and  rest  periods  have 
been  introduced. 

On  the  face  of  it,  scientific  management  results  in  a 
clear  gain  for  both  the  employer  and  the  workman, 
since  wages  on  piece  work  increase  automatically  with 
production.  Even  on  time  work  they  are  bound  to 
reflect  great  increases  in  output.  On  the  other  hand, 
speeding  up  may  be  accompanied  by  a  cut  in  wages, 
especially  on  piece  work.  Scientific  management  does 
great  violence  to  trade  union  standards,  and  tends 
toward  a  substitution  of  individual  contract  for  col- 
lective bargaining.  Organized  labor  is  strenuously  op- 
posed to  the  system,  wherever  it  results  in  violence  to 
trade-union  procedure.  The  state  of  mind  that  is 
produced  in  a  man  who  feels  that  he  is  being  exploited 
in  the  interest  of  quantity  production  is  deplorable 
from  a  moral  point  of  view  and  menacing  to  industrial 
peace.  The  recognition  of  initiative  and  of  instinctive 
demands  for  normal  expression  may  easily  be  reduced 
to  the  vanishing  point  by  a  system  designed  wholly  to 
increase  production.  Not  a  little  of  the  unrest  in  in- 
dustry today  is  due  to  this  speeding-up  process.  A 
British  writer^  pays  his  compliments  to  American 
industry  in  strong  terms:  "The  workmen  of  the 
United  States  work  under  conditions  of  surveillance, 
speeding-up,  and  analytical  watchfulness  which  the 
workmen  of  this  country  would  not  tolerate  for  a 
moment."  At  the  same  time  he  states  that  the 
American  workmen  reap  greater  benefits  by  submit- 
ting to  the  speeding-up  process  than  their  comrades 


•Arthur  Ramsay — "Terms  of  Industrial  Peace." 


6  THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

on  the  other  side  of  the  water,  who  hide  behind  estab- 
hshed  conditions  in  industry  as  the  vested  interests 
of  labor. 

Weakness  of  "scientific  management" 

Clearly,  the  difficulty  with  scientific  management  is 
that,  at  one  important  point,  it  fails  to  be  scientific.  It 
manages  everything  except  the  attitude  of  the  worker 
himself,  which  is  the  most  important  element  in  the 
situation.  As  an  American  investigator  has  aptly 
said:  "However  much  a  'rough-neck'  the  workman 
may  be,  however  crude  his  intellectual  processes,  his 
mental  machinery  is  more  complex  and  delicate  than 
that  of  the  finest  chronometer."  Mr.  C.  G.  Renold,  a 
prominent  employer  in  Manchester,  England,  has 
made  this  astute  comment  on  the  management  of 
labor  as  it  exists  today:  "It  must  be  remembered  that 
the  work  of  very  many  men,  probably  of  most,  is  given 
more  or  less  unwillingly,  and  even  should  the  intro- 
duction of  more  democratic  methods  of  business  man- 
agement entail  a  certain  amount  of  loss  of  mechanical 
efficiency,  due  to  the  greater  encumbrances  of  demo- 
cratic proceedings,  if  it  can  succeed  in  obtaining  more 
willing  work  and  cooperation,  the  net  gain  in  produc- 
tivity would  be  enormous."  Nothing  short  of  a  mental 
cooperation  of  the  workers  themselves  will  secure  the 
highest  production. 

A  "constitution"  for  industry 

The  demand  of  the  workers  for  a  share  in  control  of 
industry  has  also  a  large  economic  significance.  It 
represents  an  effort  to  restore  that  security  which  the 
workman  enjoyed  in  the  full  possession  of  his  tools 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  7 

before  the  advent  of  machinery.  He  was  then  his 
own  master,  able  to  determine  the  conditions  of  his 
employment.  The  master  workman  was  no  better 
than  his  men — only  the  first  among  equals.  Those 
were  the  days  of  craftsmanship.  The  worker  "took 
possession  of  the  works"  when  he  loaded  his  tools  on 
his  back.  Machine  production  has  changed  all  this. 
Costly  equipment  is  now  required,  representing  a 
vested  interest  whose  holder  has  a  first  claim  on  the 
product  of  the  plant.  In  theory  the  employer,  as  the 
legal  holder  of  the  property,  has  the  only  right  in  the 
situation.  His  is  the  constitutional  status.  Property 
is  an  institution — labor  is  not.  However,  the  stabili- 
zation of  industry  has  required  an  increasing  volume 
of  legislation  and  of  trade  agreement,  whose  effect  has 
been  to  raise  the  question  of  a  permanent  "constitu- 
tion for  industry." 

The  "servile  state" 

It  would  be  an  error,  however,  to  suppose  that  ag- 
gressive labor  leaders  look  to  the  state  primarily  for 
the  establishment  and  guarantee  of  constitutionalism 
in  industry.  Opinion  is  sharply  divided  on  the  effec- 
tiveness of  state  control,  but  it  cannot  be  said  that  the 
War  has  strengthened  the  demand  among  the  more 
restless  elements  in  industry  for  assumption  of  control 
by  the  state.  What  was  once  called  State  Socialism 
is  now  commonly  referred  to  as  State  Capitalism  and 
its  political  result  as  the  "servile  state."  It  is  found 
that  the  task  of  keeping  state  employes  satisfied  is  no 
easier  than  that  of  any  other  employers.  Political  con- 
trol of  industry  is  not  a  bright  prospect.  More  and 
more  labor  is  looking  to  its  own  efforts,  under  state 


8  THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

protection,  to  work  out  its  salvation  by  continuous 
conference  and  bargaining  with  the  employing  class. 
The  Railway  Brotherhoods'  plan  for  managing  the 
railroads  is  an  illuminating  example.    (See  Chapter  V.) 

Labor  and  the  law 

A  serious  ground  of  discontent  on  the  part  of  labor 
has  been  the  disposition  of  the  courts  to  emphasize 
property  rights  at  the  expense  of  human  needs  when 
rendering  decisions  in  labor  cases.  Courts  are  much 
more  liberal  than  formerly  in  such  cases,  but  the  free 
use  of  injunctions  restraining  the  activities  of  unions  is 
severely  criticized  by  labor  leaders.  The  fault  is 
probably  more  with  judicial  theory  than  with  the  sym- 
pathies of  the  judges  in  question.  A  long  process  of 
education  has  been  necessary  in  order  to  secure  recog- 
nition of  the  fundamental  justice,  regardless  of  the 
effect  on  property  interests,  of  limiting  the  labor  of 
women  and  children  and  of  surrounding  the  workers 
in  hazardous  trades  with  abundant  safeguards.  The 
A.  F.  of  L.  at  its  convention  in  June,  19 19,  passed  a 
resolution  calling  for  legislation  restraining  the  courts 
from  the  use  of  "injunctive  decrees  that  invade  per- 
sonal liberty,"  and  announcing  that  such  decrees 
would  be  treated  by  labor  as  illegal.  The  Federation, 
acting  on  the  findings  in  an  authorized  study  of  the 
powers  of  our  higher  courts,  denounced  the  courts  for 
having  "usurped"  the  right  to  declare  laws  unconsti- 
tutional. This  attitude  of  settled  disapproval  prob- 
ably has  much  to  do  with  the  tendency  of  working 
people  here  and  there  to  disregard  agreements,  and 
still  more  with  the  general  opposition  of  labor  leaders 
to  incorporation  of  their  unions.    With  the  increasing 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  9 

reasonableness  of  the  courts  there  is  undoubtedly  a  grow- 
ing tendency  on  the  part  of  labor  to  more  ready  recog- 
nition of  obligations  and  assumption  of  responsibility. 
Equally  important  with  an  enlightened  policy  on 
the  part  of  the  courts  is  a  tolerant  reasonableness  on 
the  part  of  public  officials,  and  greater  wisdom  on  the 
part  of  legislators.  I  have  had  occasion  to  intercede 
with  municipal  authorities  on  behalf  of  some  of  the 
most  orderly,  conscientious,  and  responsible  labor 
leaders  I  have  ever  known,  who  were  merely  seeking 
to  exercise  their  constitutional  right  of  free  assemblage 
for  organization  purposes.  There  is  great  danger,  po- 
litical as  well  as  moral,  in  the  widespread  tendency  to 
pass  laws  without  regard  to  their  constitutionality  and 
to  administer  them  in  a  wilful  and  capricious  manner. 

Labor  troubles ;  the  Lawrence  strike 

The  aspirations  that  are  stirring  the  heart  of  labor 
manifest  themselves  in  frequent  strikes  and  strike 
threats.  As  might  be  expected,  when  such  distur- 
bances appear  in  great  industrial  centers  they  are  not 
unmixed  as  to  the  issue  involved  and  do  not  always 
yield  readily  to  analysis.  The  strike  which  occurred 
in  Lawrence,  Massachusetts,  in  the  winter  and  spring 
of  1919  is  a  case  in  point.  The  disturbance  there  re- 
vealed virtually  everything  that  can  be  said  to  be 
wrong  with  American  industry.  Because  of  its  bear- 
ing on  the  general  situation,  I  am  setting  down  briefly 
the  results  of  a  personal  investigation. 

Racial  factors 

Lawrence  is  fertile  soil  for  industrial  disturbances. 
Its  population  of  something  over  100,000  is  considered 


lo        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

to  be  over  four-fifths  foreign,  either  by  birth  or  by 
parentage.  The  woolen  and  cotton  mills  employ  about 
35,000,  making  by  far  the  larger  part  of  the  popula- 
tion dependent  upon  these  industries.  The  ownership 
of  the  mills  is  largely  absentee,  and  there  is  little  con- 
tact between  the  owners  and  the  townspeople.  The 
great  strike  in  1912  left  many  animosities  and  the 
cleavage  between  the  English-speaking  and  foreign- 
speaking  peoples  is  well  marked.  In  one  mill,  during 
the  past  winter,  there  were  nationalities  represented 
in  the  following  proportions :  Americans,  476;  Arme- 
nians, 48;  Canadians,  98;  English,  35;  Greeks,  6; 
French,  2;  Germans,  24;  Hebrews,  2;  Irish,  83; 
Itahans,  213;  Lithuanians,  258;  Poles,  63;  Welsh,  2; 
Portuguese,  63;  Russians,  16;  and  Scotch,  31.  It 
seems  that  in  the  past  too  little  encouragement  has 
been  given  to  naturalization.  (Lawrence  is  not  alone 
in  this  civic  delinquency.  The  case  is  reported  of  an 
employer  who  discharged  a  man  because  he  took  time 
off  to  become  naturalized.)  The  foreign-speaking 
workers  of  Lawrence  prefer  to  live  in  colonies  and 
have  resisted  efforts  to  relieve  congestion.  A  Federal 
investigator  stated  that  one-third  of  the  population 
lives  in  one-thirteenth  of  the  area.  They  have  vir- 
tually inherited  the  city  and  have  been  allowed  to 
maintain  whatever  standard  of  living  they  chose. 

"48-54" 

The  issue  in  the  last  strike  was  on  its  face  identical 
with  that  of  191 2 — a  reduction  of  hours  which  was 
asked  for,  accompanied  by  a  reduction  in  wages,  which 
was  accepted  by  labor  officials,  but  not  reckoned  with 
by  the  workers.    The  contention  was  tersely  expressed 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  ii 

by  the  slogan  which  one  saw  on  doors  and  walks — 
"48 — 54" — fifty-four  hours'  pay  for  forty-eight  hours' 
work.  It  was  merely  an  awkward  way  of  putting  a 
demand  that  the  cut  in  hours  should  not  affect  the 
total  wage. 

Low  wages 

A  very  small  percentage  of  the  textile  workers  are 
unionized,  and  while  the  more  skilled  operations,  such 
as  weaving,  sometimes  command  high  wages,  many 
workers,  both  men  and  women,  were  at  the  time  of  the 
strike  receiving  less  than  $15  a  week.  Men  were 
shoveling  coal  for  $10  a  week.  In  one  mill,  employing 
normally  over  7,000,  the  average  wage  of  men  was 
about  $22  a  week  and  of  women,  $17,50.  These  are 
the  agent's  figures  and  he  also  stated  that  some  em- 
ployes— fewer  than  a  hundred — were  receiving  less 
than  $12.  The  average  wage  was  much  below  that 
estimated  by  the  United  States  War  Labor  Board 
for  the  support  of  a  family.  The  workers  knew  this 
and  they  also  knew  that  the  mills  had  made  large 
profits  during  the  previous  year.  The  mill  just  re- 
ferred to  did  $60,000,000  of  business  in  191 8.  Before 
the  War,  dividends  were  not  conspicuously  large: 
American  Woolen  common  received  its  first  dividend 
in  1916.  But  in  the  aggregate  ordinary  earnings  look 
large,  and  war  profits  look  mountainous. 

Suspicion  and  recrimination 

It  was  evident  to  a  disinterested  person  that  a  funda- 
mental weakness  in  the  mill  owners'  position  was  the 
lack  of  a  basis  of  understanding  and  a  technique  for 
mutual  agreement.     Of  course,  neither  side  credited 


12        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

the  claims  put  forth  by  the  other  side.  On  one  occa- 
sion an  agitator  among  the  employes  claimed  that  the 
stock  of  a  certain  company  was  selling  at  300,  and 
v,^hen  shown  the  quotations — at  107 — insisted  that 
they  were  "doctored."  The  prompt  offer  to  deliver 
him  stock  at  the  rate  quoted,  in  exchange  for  his  house 
and  lot,  made  no  apparent  impression.  The  mill 
owners,  on  the  other  hand,  could  see  little  but  greed 
and  ingratitude  in  the  strikers'  demands.  They  called 
the  strike  a  Bolshevist  uprising,  and  in  support  of 
this  charge  they  called  to  witness  incendiary  speeches 
made  by  various  revolutionary  agitators,  who  tried 
to  capitalize  the  unrest  for  their  own  propaganda.  To 
be  called  Bolsheviks  angered  some,  amazed  others,  and 
mystified  the  majority.  But  the  leaders  knew  that  they 
were  conducting  a  movement  that  was  only  in  part 
the  expression  of  a  wage  demand — it  was  significant 
of  the  world  unrest  and  had  Russia  as  its  background. 

Singing  the  "International" 

The    meetings    of    the    general    strike    committee 
opened  with  a  verse  of  the  famous  "International": 

"Arise,  ye  prisoners  of  starvation ! 

Arise,  ye  wretched  of  the  earth, 
For  justice  thunders  condemnation, 

A  better  world's  in  birth. 
No  more  tradition's  chains  shall  bind  us, 

Arise,  ye  slaves;  no  more  in  thrall! 
The  earth  shall  rise  on  new  foundations, 

We  have  been  naught,  we  shall  be  all. 

'Tis  the  final  conflict, 

Let  each  stand  in  his  place. 

The  Industrial  Union 

Shall  be  the  human  race." 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  13 

The  Italian  section  sang  this  lustily  one  afternoon  in 
honor  of  "Big  Bill"  Haywood,  the  I.  W.  W.  leader, 
when  word  came  of  his  release  from  jail.  Just  what 
he  had  to  do  with  the  situation  was  not  made  clear; 
probably  to  the  vast  majority  of  the  men  and  women  in 
that  crowded  hall  his  name  was  only  the  symbol  of  an 
ideal,  itself  but  dimly  grasped,  yet  becoming  more  and 
more  articulate  as  a  demand  for  industrial  freedom. 
In  respect  to  revolutionary  significance  Lawrence  is 
typical  of  radical  centers  throughout  the  United 
States.  The  general  strike  in  Seattle  during  the  past 
winter  was  inspired  by  revolutionary  ideals.  Bol- 
shevism has  an  international  significance  quite  apart 
from  its  Russian  manifestation.  Shorn  of  a  tempo- 
rary emotional  content,  it  means  the  assumption  of 
industrial  control  by  the  workers  through  direct 
industrial  action.  This  doctrine  has  not  a  few  apostles 
in  America,  even  though  the  rank  and  file  of  the 
workers  know  little  about  it  and  probably  care  less. 

A  "living  wage" 

The  United  Textile  Workers,  affiliated  with  the 
American  Federation  of  Labor,  issued  the  original  de- 
mand for  a  short  week,  but  would  have  nothing  to  do 
with  the  "48 — 54"  strike.  Their  position  was  that 
the  wages  would  be  adjusted  shortly  in  accord  with  a 
general  precedent,  and  the  revolutionary  complexion 
of  the  strike  alienated  them  still  more  than  what  they 
considered  its  inopportune  character.  The  strike, 
therefore,  fell  into  the  hands  of  the  radical  and  aggres- 
sive Amalgamated  Clothing  Workers  of  America,  who 
launched  a  movement  for  a  new  textile  organization 
affiliated  closely  with  their  own. 


14        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

The  merits  of  the  wage  issue  were  hard  to  determine 
in  a  way  acceptable  to  the  mill  owners  or  the  public. 
Rents  in  the  tenement  sections  are  apparently  aver- 
age, and  crowding  is  common.  The  standard  of  living 
is  low,  and  money  that  should  go  into  rent  and  house 
furnishing  is  frequently  hoarded.  The  mill  owners  look 
at  the  savings  bank  reports  and  shake  their  heads.  It 
is  a  relatively  advanced  social  consciousness  that  ac- 
cepts the  responsibility  of  guardianship  for  a  back- 
ward people.  The  eyes  that  are  fixed  upon  maximum 
wages  and  industrial  savings  accounts  do  not  see  the 
actual  hardships  among  low-paid  workers.  An  out- 
standing need  in  industry  is  a  way  of  making  its 
management  responsible  to  the  community.  The 
simplest  facts  are  often  accessible  only  to  the  govern- 
ment. 

The  morals  of  magnates 

To  many  who  read  the  magazine  articles  on  the  strike 
this  situation  seemed  clearly  abnormal,  and  the  textile 
employers  were  assumed  to  be  of  a  peculiarly  avari- 
cious type.  If  the  case  were  thus  exceptional,  it  would 
be  simple.  But  this  is  not  true  at  all.  The  individual 
ofificers  of  the  mills  are  among  the  best  people  one 
meets  in  the  industrial  world.  This  is  the  serious  part 
of  it.  Putting  "honest,"  respectable,  even  religious, 
men  in  command  of  an  industry  does  not  always  alter 
its  fundamental  character.  Employers  who  are  church 
members  have  strikes  on  their  hands  just  like  the  rest, 
and  are  sometimes  in  the  end  adjudged  clearly  in  the 
wrong.  A  careful  American  observer  of  the  proceed- 
ings of  the  Coal  Commission  inquiry  in  England,  fol- 
lowing the  War,  said  that  the  coal  owners'  representa- 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  15 

tives  on  the  Commission  made,  "each  in  his  own  way, 
an  impression  for  sincerity  and  staunch  character," 
His  comment  continues:  "The  inquiry  reveals  simply 
that  they,  Hke  the  miners,  are  caught  in  an  obsolete 
organization,  functioning  creakily  in  this  new  century." 

The  question  of  facts 

The  settlement  of  the  strike  is  perhaps  as  illuminat- 
ing as  its  long  and  rather  eventful  course.  The  United 
Textile  Workers,  during  May,  issued  a  demand  for  a 
straight  increase  of  fifteen  per  cent  in  all  cotton 
mills;  later  they  included  the  woolen  mills.  They 
based  the  demand  on  improved  market  conditions  and 
an  obvious  inadequacy  of  wages.  Presently  the  mill 
owners,  whose  agents  in  conferences  and  interviews 
had  repeatedly  pronounced  the  demands  of  the  strikers 
impossible,  granted  the  still  greater  demand  of  the 
union.  There  is  scarcely  any  room  for  a  doubt  that 
the  mills  were  resisting  the  strikers  for  disciplinary 
purposes  and  would  have  yielded  the  wage  demand  at 
any  time  if  the  radical  leaders  and  revolutionary 
propaganda  could  have  been  excluded.  This,  in  sub- 
stance, was  told  a  New  York  Times  correspondent  by 
a  prominent  mill  official.  Quite  aside  from  the  merits 
of  this  attitude,  the  lack  of  ingenuousness  on  the  part 
of  the  mill  owners  can  have  only  one  effect  on  future 
disorders:  when  they  solemnly  declare  that  wage  de- 
mands are  such  as  to  cripple  the  industry  they  need 
expect  no  one  to  pay  the  slightest  heed  to  their  pro- 
tests. In  a  conference  called  by  church  groups,  which 
was  attended  by  representatives  of  the  mills  and  of 
the  strikers,  it  was  strongly  urged  that  the  mill 
owners  lay  their  facts  affecting  wages  on  the  table  for 


i6        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

public  scrutiny.     In  the  light  of  the  settlement  their 
unwillingness  to  do  this  appears  quite  intelligible. 

Too  much  power  in  one  place 

Two  facts  in  such  a  situation  as  this  stand  out  as  of 
paramount  significance:  the  evil  due  to  centralization 
of  power  in  the  hands  of  a  very  few  persons,  and  the 
extreme  costliness  of  modern  machine  production. 

The  centralization  of  power  inflicts  upon  the  heads 
of  the  industries  a  responsibility  that  is  morally  unfair 
to  them,  as  well  as  dangerous  to  the  workers  whose 
vital  interests  are  in  their  hands.  It  is  unfair,  first, 
because  no  small  group  of  persons  may  be  assumed  to 
grasp  adequately  and  with  fairness  of  mind  the  many 
human  interests  which  must  be  balanced  against  one 
another  in  a  modern  industry.  It  is  virtually  impos- 
sible.  Secondly,  this  centralization  creates  a  group 
of  so-called  directors,  who  are  frequently  as  powerless 
to  modify  industrial  policies  as  are  outsiders.  In  the 
textile  mills  the  presidents  and  treasurers  have  full 
command  of  the  industry,  not  because  they  intimidate 
the  other  directors,  but  because  their  domination  is 
psychologically  inevitable.  Where  one  person  controls 
others,  the  result  is  not  always  produced  by  inordinate 
pressure,  but  often  by  force  of  a  mental  command  of 
the  situation.  Psychologists  speak  of  the  instinct  of 
"mastery  and  submission."  It  operates  in  industrial 
management  with  fatal  effect,  because  one  or  two 
people  are  in  command  of  the  facts.  A  director  in  a 
Lawrence  mill  told  me  that  he  could  not,  even  by 
weekly  visits  to  the  mill,  acquire  information  that 
would  put  him  in  position  to  have  an  original  voice 
in  the  determination  of  policy.     In  the  presence  of 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  17 

those  whose  statements  about  vital  facts  one  is  not  in 
position  to  question,  he  instinctively  subsides.  To  be 
sure,  a  director  finding  himself  in  this  position  can  re- 
sign. It  may  help  him  out,  personally,  but  from  the 
point  of  view  of  redeeming  the  industry  the  proposal 
that  a  conscientious  director  make  place  for  one  of  less 
sensitive  fiber  is  not  particularly  helpful.  Thirdly,  the 
corporation  director  is  between  two  fires.  He  is  re- 
sponsible both  for  wages  and  for  dividends.  Assuming 
that,  as  director,  he  is  disinterested,  his  task  often  be- 
comes one  of  attempting  to  secure  just  advantages  to 
one  group  at  the  expense  of  the  other.  The  gentleman 
referred  to  above  said  that  he  voted  in  addition  to  his 
own  holdings  a  considerable  amount  of  stock  which  he 
held  in  a  fiduciary  capacity.  Here,  then,  are  three 
types  of  relationship  borne  by  the  director  to  the  in- 
dustry: he  represents  his  own  interests,  those  of  his 
clients,  and,  in  general,  the  stockholders  who  elected 
him.  Some  of  his  clients  tell  him  that  they  are  not 
getting  a  "living  dividend."  A  modern  corporation 
may  be  composed  of  millionaires  and  dependent  poor. 
The  honest  director  is  often  in  a  bad  way. 

Profits  first 

The  hazard  to  the  workers  in  an  industry  under 
highly  centralized  control  results  from  the  perfectly 
evident  fact  that  this  supposition  of  disinterestedness 
on  the  part  of  directors  is  hardly  within  reason.  Direc- 
tors are  chosen  from  among  the  large  stockholders,  on 
the  theory  that  a  heavy  holding  is  a  guarantee  of 
faithfulness  to  their  property  trust.  This  theory  of 
what  a  director  is  for  is  admirably  illustrated  by  the 
action  of  the  Michigan  Supreme  Court,  in  condemning 


i8        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

the  directors  of  the  Ford  Company  for  decreeing  that 
all  the  earnings  beyond  five  per  cent  a  month  should 
be  reinvested  in  the  business,  with  the  avowed  intent 
of  employing  more  labor  and  thus  achieving  a  social 
end.  The  court  upheld  the  protest  of  aggrieved  stock- 
holders, giving  its  judgment  that  "a  business  corpora- 
tion is  organized  for  the  profit  of  the  stockholders, 
and  the  discretion  of  the  directors  .  .  .  does  not 
extend  to  the  reduction  of  profits  in  order  to  benefit 
the  public,  making  the  profits  incident  thereto." 
The  Lawrence  strike  throws  a  lurid  light  on  the 
helplessness  of  the  modern  industrial  community  in 
the  hands  of  manufacturers  who  govern  their  indus- 
tries wilfully. 

High  cost  of  industry 

By  the  costliness  of  machine  production  I  mean 
that,  as  at  present  organized,  the  average  industry 
can  scarcely  meet  the  so-called  legitimate  charges 
upon  it — interest  on  investment  at  what  is  considered 
a  reasonable  rate,  salaries  of  management  sufficient  to 
retain  such  service  (a  large  element  in  the  cost  of 
operation,  because  there  is  a  natural  monopoly  of 
technical  skill) ,  and  a  wage  to  labor  that  will  maintain 
a  plane  of  living  which  the  community  can  approve. 
In  many  of  our  industries,  the  textiles,  for  example,  or, 
more  notably,  the  railroads,  it  is  very  doubtful  if  the 
last  named  of  these  claims  can  be  met  without  an  en- 
croachment upon  either  the  first  or  second  that  will  be 
fatal  to  the  industry.  Obviously,  to  interrupt  the  flow 
of  capital  into  an  industry  or  to  lose  technical  manage- 
ment to  competitors  who  bid  higher  for  it  would  be 
ruinous  to  production  on  the  present  basis.    Even  as 


THE  LABOR  SITUATION  19 

it  is,  a  large  percentage  of  industrial  concerns  pay  no 
dividends  on  their  common  stock. 

Unpaid  debts 

Ordinarily,  in  the  competitive  effort  to  reduce  costs 
the  employer  finds  that  his  charge  for  labor  is  the 
first  to  admit  of  depression.  Labor,  like  capital  and 
management,  must  be  paid  enough  to  keep  it  on  the 
job,  but  being  much  less  mobile  than  either  manage- 
ment or  capital,  it  suffers  an  inevitable  disadvantage. 
In  practice,  the  average  employer  avoids  meeting  the 
issue  of  a  "living  wage,"  because  experience  proves 
that  he  can  avoid  it  with  impunity.  An  interesting 
illustration  of  the  underlying  difficulty  occurred  in 
New  York  in  191 8  when  the  Photo-Engravers'  Union 
served  notice  on  the  employers  that  they  had  investi- 
gated the  apparent  inability  of  the  industry  to  pay  a 
reasonable  wage  and  had  decided  that  the  employers 
were  unscientific  in  their  methods  of  selling.  The 
union  proceeded  to  submit  a  new  scale  of  prices  and 
ordered  the  employers  to  put  it  into  effect  on  a  given 
day!  This  the  employers  did,  and  the  increased  price 
made  possible  the  desired  advance  in  wages.  One 
scarcely  knows  whether  such  a  bold  and  revolution- 
ary procedure  should  startle  most  the  employers  or 
the  general  public.  Had  the  commodity  involved 
been  bread  or  shoes,  the  act  of  the  union  would  have 
had  more  than  a  passing  interest.  The  consuming 
public  cannot  always  come  conveniently  to  the  rescue 
of  contending  factors  in  production.  There  is  good 
ground  for  suspecting  that  under  the  load  of  expected 
dividends,  salaries  of  management,  and  an  "American 
standard"  wage,  many  industries  would  collapse  of 


20        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

their  own  weight.  In  fact,  it  may  properly  be  con- 
tended that  industry  is  now  extensively  subsidized  by 
the  community.  New  York  City  has  fifty-five  homes 
maintained  for  girls  whose  wages  will  not  allow  them  to 
live  in  ordinary  dwellings.  The  industries  in  which  those 
girls  are  employed  are  not  paying  their  fixed  charges. 
To  recognize  this  condition  does  not  commit  one 
to  a  particular  diagnosis  or  an  exclusive  remedy. 
Faulty  accounting,  the  subservience  of  industrial  to 
financial  considerations,  reckless  competition,  ex- 
travagance, poor  organization,  and  poor  labor  man- 
agement no  doubt  account  in  large  part  for  the  near- 
bankruptcy  of  many  industries.  What  is  revealed  is 
a  constitutional  weakness  in  the  industrial  order  and 
the  necessity  for  more  fundamental  thinking  than  has 
hitherto  found  a  place  in  the  industrial  world.  It  calls 
for  more  than  economic  treatment.  "Industrial  rela- 
tions," says  the  younger  Mr.  Rockefeller,  "are  essen- 
tially human  relations."  Industry  is  in  need  of  ethical 
rebuilding. 

The  new  day 

Running  counter  to  the  present  industrial  tradition 
is  the  new  spirit  which  proclaims  industry  a  form  of 
service.  Tt  is  insisting  that  labor  shall  have  a  first 
claim  on  the  product.  It  is  renovating  politics  by 
bringing  industrial  interests  in  by  the  front  door  in- 
stead of  by  the  back.  It  is  causing  a  conscientious  re- 
examination, on  the  part  of  employers,  of  the  whole 
enterprise  of  production,  and  setting  free  social  im- 
pulses long  imprisoned  by  a  sterile  industrial  system. 
This  spirit  is  only  struggling  for  expression,  but  it  will 
dominate  the  new  day. 


CHAPTER  II 
ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR 

A  new  popular  interest  in  labor  problems  has  lately 
arisen,  stimulated  by  the  War.  Many  persons  are 
reading  labor  news  for  the  first  time.  Matters  that 
formerly  were  confined  to  trade  journals  are  finding 
their  way  into  the  public  press.  But  it  is  a  mistake  to 
suppose  that  one  may  become  familiar  with  the  labor 
movement  by  giving  attention  only  to  its  new  and 
extraordinary  features.  New  political  activities,  the 
tendency  toward  mass  industrial  action,  and  the  emer- 
gence of  new  forms  of  democratic  expression  can  be 
understood  only  in  their  setting  within  the  trade  union 
movement. 

There  has  been  recently  a  disposition  on  the  part  of 
persons  of  liberal  and  radical  temper  to  discount  and 
discredit  trade  unionism  because  of  its  preoccupation 
with  wages  and  hours.  The  criticism  is  not  without 
point  and  should  be  seriously  heeded,  but  what  labor 
has  today  of  a  tangible  sort  it  owes  to  the  patient, 
often  monotonous  application  of  trade  union  pro- 
cedure. Not  only  so,  but  new  types  of  labor  organiza- 
tion and  activity  will  fail  in  so  far  as  they  overlook  or 
do  violence  to  the  structure  and  method  of  trade 
unionism.  It  is  in  this  deposit  of  successive  genera- 
tions of  labor  history  that  the  basis  of  a  constitution 
for  industry  must  be  found. 


22        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

The  trade  union  movement 

Trade  unionism  goes  back  to  the  craft  guilds  of  the 
Middle  Ages.  These  guilds  were  well-recognized  social 
institutions,  serving  quite  as  much  to  protect  the  con- 
suming public  as  to  protect  the  craftsmen  themselves. 
The  craft  ideal  still  dominates  the  union  movement  in 
the  main.  The  workman's  skill  at  his  trade  is  his 
"vested  interest."  We  still  speak  of  "journeymen" 
tailors  and  printers,  recalling  the  days  when  the 
craftsman,  on  finishing  his  apprenticeship,  became  a 
recognized  master  of  his  trade,  free  to  travel  as  such 
wherever  his  work  might  call  him.  Over  against  the 
craft  plan  of  organization  is  the  industrial  union,  in 
which  all  the  workers  of  an  industry,  highly  skilled  and 
slightly  skilled  alike,  are  organized  in  one  body.  Such 
an  organization,  when  it  overcomes  the  difficulties  in- 
herent in  the  plan,  becomes  much  more  formidable 
than  a  craft  union  and  a  more  definite  expression  of 
working-class  consciousness.  Industrial  unionism  is 
growing  in  favor  in  certain  sections  of  Europe  and  of 
America,  always  among  the  more  radical  elements  of 
labor.  There  are  several  strong  industrial  unions  in 
America  that  are  in  good  standing  with  the  American 
Federation  of  Labor — the  United  Mine  Workers  and 
the  Brewery  Workers,  for  example.  But  as  the  empha- 
sis passes  over  from  craft  bargaining  to  mass  industrial 
action,  an  organization  loses  caste  with  conservative 
labor.  Industrial  unionism  is  feared  because  of  its 
revolutionary  potency. 

The  A.  F.  of  L. 

In  the  United  States  organized  labor  is  represented 
mainly  by  the  American  Federation  of  Labor  (A.  F.  of 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR  '  23 

L.)  with  its  III  national  and  international  unions. 
The  word  "international"  signifies  usually  that  the 
union  extends  into  Canada.  Certain  strong  organiza- 
tions remain  outside  the  Federation,  of  which  the 
better  known  are  the  four  railway  brotherhoods.  The 
way  has  now  been  opened  for  the  afhliation  of  these 
organizations  with  the  A.  F.  of  L.  The  Federation  re- 
ported at  its  June  meeting,  1919,  the  largest  member- 
ship in  its  history — 3,260,000.  It  has  five  depart- 
ments— Union  Label,  Building  Trades,  Metal  Trades, 
Railway  Employes,  and  Mining.  Samuel  Gompers, 
the  president,  is  the  outstanding  figure  in  the  "regular" 
labor  movement  in  America. 

Women  unionists 

.  The  Woman'sTrade  Union  League,  with  about  75, 000 
affiliated  members,  represents  the  best  traditions  and 
most  effective  efforts  of  organized  woman's  labor  in 
the  United  States.  Like  the  A.  F.  of  L.  it  is  a  federa- 
tion of  trade  unionists.  It  would  be  difficult  to  over- 
estimate the  service  rendered  the  country  during  the 
War  by  this  organization.  Its  standards  for  women's 
work  became  the  standards  of  the  Federal  Govern- 
ment, when  the  latter  organized  its  Women  in  Indus- 
try Service.  The  League  is  furnishing,  to  a  degree 
quite  out  of  proportion  to  its  numerical  strength,  the 
spiritual  ideals  of  American  labor.  The  president,  Mrs. 
Raymond  Robins  of  Chicago,  during  the  War  thus 
described  the  goal  of  labor  organization: 

"Just  as  the  individual  nation  cannot  alone  protect 
Its  liberty  and  life  in  this  world  war,  so  the  individual 
worker  cannot  alone  protect  her  liberty  and  life  in 
the  industrial  struggle.    The  need  of  a  self-governing 


24        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

citizenship — self-governing  in  industry  as  well  as 
politics — is  greater  at  this  hour  than  at  any  other  in 
the  life  of  America." 


Unionism  in  Europe 

In  Great  Britain,  unionism  has  become  all  but  uni- 
versal. The  movement  is  united,  strong,  and  definite 
in  its  aims.  The  Trades  Union  Congress  (the  British 
A.  F.  of  L.)  has  over  4,000,000  affiliated  members. 
There  is  a  strong  Woman's  Trade  Union  League  and  a 
National  Federation  of  Women  Workers.  The  British 
Unions  are  a  bewildering  spectacle — 1,123  were  re- 
ported in  1916.  The  craft  tradition  still  predominates 
in  English  trade  organization,  but  the  trend  is  toward 
industrial  unionism,  of  which  the  Triple  Alliance, 
later  referred  to,  is  an  example.  The  activities  and 
demands  of  British  labor  have  found  political  expres- 
sion and  are  discussed  in  the  following  chapter. 

Germany  had  in  1914  a  little  over  3,250,000  trade 
unionists.  There  are  three  groups — "Free"  or  Social 
Democratic  unions,  the  "Christian"  unions,  and  the 
"Liberal"  unions.  The  first  organization  is  by  far  the 
most  powerful,  but  it  is  opposed  by  the  other  two. 
Women  are  included  in  considerable  numbers.  The 
forty-seven  "Free"  unions  stand  in  remarkable  contrast 
to  the  multitude  of  British  organizations. 

Trade  unionism  in  France  is  represented  by  the 
Confederation  Generale  de  Travail  (C.  G.  T.)  with  a 
membership  of  more  than  a  million.  The  C.  G.  T.  is 
strongly  "syndicalist"  although  it  has  grown  more 
conservative  during  the  War.     (See  Chapter  V.) 

Italy  has  its  Confederazione  Generate  di  Lavoro,  or- 
ganized  on   the  industrial  basis,   numbering  about 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     25 

400,000;  the  Unione  Sindicale  with  about  100,000 
members ;  Catholic  Unions,  numbering  about  120,000 ; 
and  a  Federation  of  Rural  Workers,  enrolling  150,000. 
The  first  two  organizations  constitute  the  aggressive 
labor  movement.  Italy  is  predominantly  agricul- 
tural, but  the  influence  of  organized  labor,  particu- 
larly in  its  revolutionary  phase,  is  a  growing  force. 

Canada's  labor  organizations  are  for  the  most  part 
continuous  with  those  of  the  United  States  and  Great 
Britain.  There  are  160,000  members,  more  than 
80,000  of  whom  belong  to  so-called  "international" 
unions,  affiliated,  in  the  main,  with  the  A.  F.  of  L.  In 
western  Canada,  labor  is  now  reflecting  the  restlessness 
of  the  movement  in  our  own  northwest. 

An  international  labor  conference  held  in  Amster- 
dam during  the  present  summer  (191 9)  chose  William 
A.  Appleton,  of  the  British  Federation  of  Trade 
Unions,  as  president  of  a  new  international  trade 
union  movement.  Leon  Jouhaux,  of  the  French 
Confederation  was  made  secretary. 

Structure  and  methods 

Labor  federations  are  delegated  bodies,  which  secure 
among  their  constituent  unions  a  measure  of  unity  in 
policy  and  action.  The  actual  bones  of  the  movement 
are  found  in  the  trade  unions  themselves,  which  are 
organized  on  the  basis  of  "locals,"  district  councils, 
state,  and  national  or  international  bodies. 

Trade  unions  have  a  dues-paying  membership,  a 
general  form  of  organization  and  government,  and 
stated  methods  of  work.  The  locals  often  function  as 
social  centers  and  as  educational  agencies — through 
addresses,  discussion,  and  libraries.    The  Employers' 


26        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

Industrial  Commission  which  studied  British  indus- 
trial conditions  for  the  U.  S.  Department  of  Labor, 
found  considerable  numbers  of  workmen  attending 
classes  in  economics  in  preference  to  the  moving-pic- 
ture houses.  Many  unions  have  insurance  benefits. 
The  various  locals  or  councils  of  a  city  commonly  unite 
to  form  a  "central  labor  union,"  which  is  a  diminutive 
A.  F.  of  L.  The  primary  aim  of  the  union  is  to  estab- 
lish uniform  rules  for  the  trade,  by  regulating  the  pro- 
cedure of  its  members  and  by  enforcing  its  demands 
upon  employers.  The  union  label  method  of  enforcing 
labor  standards  is  better  in  theory  than  in  practice. 
The  union  puts  its  official  label  on  its  product  as  a 
guarantee  that  it  was  produced  under  "union  condi- 
tions." But  there  are  relatively  few  persons,  not  them- 
selves members  of  unions,  who  demand  the  union 
label  in  purchasing  goods.  And  there  is  not  sufficient 
unity  in  the  labor  movement  to  guarantee  mutual 
respect  among  unions  for  each  other's  labels.  A 
little  reflection  upon  what  the  absence  of  the  union 
label  may  signify  as  to  the  conditions  under  which 
the  article  we  propose  to  buy  was  made  would  lead 
us,  whenever  possible,  to  grant  labor's  simple  request 
that  we  look  for. its  stamp  of  approval. 

Strikes 

The  strike  is  the  ultimate  method  of  enforcing  labor 
demands,  but  it  operates  more  often  potentially  than 
actually.  The  strike  is  the  labor  counterpart  of  the 
employer's  "lockout."  Wages  and  hours  are  the  com- 
mon objects  of  strikes.  A  secondary  object,  which, 
because  of  its  vital  nature,  is  often  made  a  primary 
demand,  is  the  "recognition  of  the  union."     Union 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     27 

labor  knows  that  only  by  maintaining  the  right  of  final 
endorsement  of  all  conditions  of  employment  can  its 
economic  power  be  secured.  This  leads  to  the  demand 
for  the  "closed  shop" — only  union  members  to  be 
employed.  In  practice  this  principle  is  admitted  fre- 
quently by  employers  to  the  extent  of  declaring  a 
"preferential  shop,"  in  which  union  members  have 
preference  when  they  are  available.  The  open  shop  is 
still  the  rule  in  America,  and  labor  has  only  a  limited 
control  save  in  certain  well  organized  trades,  such  as 
the  brewery  workers,  the  printing  and  bookbinding 
trades,  and  the  cigar  makers,  whose  organizations  are 
so  strong  as  virtually  to  dominate  the  trade. 

Unity  is  sought  by  the  expedient  of  the  sympathetic 
strike.  Theoretically,  allied  trades  can  by  concerted 
action  bring  a  large  section  of  industry  to  a  standstill 
at  any  time.  The  cost  of  striking,  however,  and  the 
difficulty  of  overcoming  "jurisdictional"  disputes  in 
allied  trades,  make  wholesale  strikes  less  common  than 
might  be  expected. 

A  significant  development  which  is  symptomatic  of 
the  general  unrest  in  industry  following  the  War  is  the 
widening  range  of  issues  for  which  the  strike  is  invoked, 
and  the  refinement  of  method  which  it  is  undergoing. 
Radicals  have  been  calling  for  a  general  strike  to  pro- 
test against  the  life  imprisonment  of  Tom  Mooney,  for 
alleged  participation  in  the  Preparedness  Day  bomb 
outrage  in  San  Francisco,  in  July,  1916.  It  is  widely 
believed  by  working  people  that  Mooney  is  the  victim 
of  a  "frame-up,"  and  this  conviction  was  strengthened 
by  the  report  of  President  Wilson's  investigation  com- 
mission and,  more  recently,  by  the  report  of  a  special 
investigator  of  the  Department  of  Labor.    A  general 


28        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

strike  is  advocated  to  enforce  the  demand  for  the 
release  of  Eugene  V.  Debs,  who  is  serving  a  ten-year 
term  for  violation  of  the  espionage  law. 

The  May  Day  disturbances  in  Europe  had  an 
avowed  political  significance.  The  British  labor  party 
has  proposed  to  the  Trades  Union  Congress  that 
strikes  be  organized  in  protest  against  the  Russian 
policy  of  the  British  Government.  More  and  more, 
strikes  are  taking  on  the  character  of  organized  war. 
The  lockout  of  the  Willys-Overland  employes  in 
Toledo  was  followed  by  a  proposal  to  collect  fifty  cents 
a  week  from  every  union  laborer  in  the  city  for  the 
support  of  the  strikers,  and,  if  necessary,  to  withdraw 
all  union  savings  from  the  city  banks  and  start  a  union 
bank.  A  union  cooperative  store  was  also  proposed. 
In  Winnipeg,  the  police  joined  the  general  strike. 

Trade  agreements 

The  trade  agreement  is  an  outstanding  achievement 
of  organized  labor,  for  keeping  the  peace  in  industry. 
This  is  a  product  of  laborious  collective  bargaining 
through  the  years.  A  notable  example  is  that  obtain- 
ing between  Hart,  Schaffner,  and  Marx,  clothing  man- 
ufacturers of  Chicago,  and  the  Amalgamated  Clothing 
Workers  of  America.  It  not  only  defines  minutely 
conditions  of  employment,  but  provides  a  technique 
for  the  settlement  of  disputes.  The  Hart,  Schaffner, 
and  Marx  agreement  is  particularly  interesting,  be- 
cause it  is  maintained  with  a  radical  union,  whose 
leaders  are  syndicalist  in  theory,  although  they  use 
the  conservative  trade  agreement  method  to  secure 
immediate  and  tangible  results.    The  trade  agreement 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     29 

plan  is  now  spreading  through  the  ready-made  clothing 
industry.  The  International  Typographical  Union, 
maintains  an  elaborate  agreement  for  the  arbitration 
of  disputes  with  the  American  Newspaper  Publishers' 
Association.  Evidence  is  not  wanting  that  labor  has 
taught  many  employers  the  lesson  of  effective  organi- 
zation, and  not  a  few  employers  are  coming  to  regard 
organization  on  the  part  of  labor  as  both  inevitable 
and  desirable. 

Employers'  attitude 

•  At  present  employers  are  of  two  classes  in  their 
attitude  toward  labor  organization.  On  the  one  hand 
are  those  who  will  not  treat  with  the  union  under  any 
circumstances,  but  who  profess  themselves  always 
willing  to  meet  committees  of  their  own  employes.  On 
the  other  hand  are  those  who  insist  on  dealing  only 
with  the  responsible  representatives  of  a  national  or- 
ganization. The  reason  for  this  contradiction  is  not 
far  to  seek.  The  employer  naturally  runs  his  own 
plant  independently  as  long  as  he  can.  When  he  has 
only  his  own  employes  to  treat  with,  he  can  more 
easily  dominate  the  situation,  up  to  a  certain  point. 
His  domination  may  not  be  wholly  conscious  or  delib- 
erate; it  may  be  psychological  as  much  as  economic. 
A  man  one  can  call  by  his  first  name  is  not  so  formid- 
able as  an  outsider.  Also,  the  choice  of  intelligent 
leadership  and  spokesmanship  within  one  establish- 
ment is  limited.  However,  when  the  necessity  for  fre- 
quent bargaining  and  secure  agreement  .arises,  the 
employer  discovers  that  he  must  deal  with  masters  of 
the  trade  who  are  responsible  in  a  large  way  for  the 


30        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

carrying  out  of  pledges.  It  not  infrequently  happens, 
as  in  the  case  of  the  insurrectionary  shop  stewards  in 
England  and  the  Lawrence  strikers,  that  the  powerful 
trade  unions  represent  a  conservative  opposition 
which  aligns  itself  with  that  of  the  employers.  The 
old  line  unions  seem  to  suffer  from  an  extreme  centrali- 
zation and  stereotyped  procedure.  A  growing  demand 
of  labor  is  for  greater  democracy  and  elasticity  in  the 
mechanism  of  its  own  organization. 

"Ca'  canny" 

A  common  charge  against  organized  labor  is  the  sys- 
tematic limitation  of  output.  Undoubtedly  this  has 
been  practiced,  and  to  a  reprehensible  degree.  It  is  a 
bit  difficult,  however,  to  discriminate  morally-between 
such  a  policy  and  the  propaganda  going  forward 
among  cotton  growers  in  the  south,  for  example,  for  a 
deliberate  curtailment  of  planting  in  order  to  maintain 
the  price.  The  limitation  of  output  was  an  inevitable 
result  of  the  scare  created  by  the  advent  of  machinery, 
of  the  ever-present  fear  of  unemployment,  and  of  the 
very  human  temptation  to  "take  it  easy."  Aggravated 
limitation  of  work — loafing,  which  is  known  in  Great 
Britain  as  "Ca'canny" — is  also  a  mild  equivalent  of  tne 
strike,  and  may  be  employed  as  a  coercive  means  or 
for  revenge.  A  very  liberal  employer  said  to  me  that 
he  was  entirely  friendly  to  union  labor,  but  he  found 
the  overtime  rule — time-and-a-half — a  source  of  un- 
fairness to  him.  It  is  easy  to  be  very  deliberate,  and 
devoted  to  detail  when  the  job  can  be  prolonged  after 
the  whistle  blows  and  labor  is  then  worth  half  as  much 
again.  There  is  no  final  cure  for  limitation  of  output 
save  the  introduction  of  a  new  motive  which  makes  the 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     31 

worker,  in  common  with   the  employer,  zealous  for 
industrial  efficiency. 

The  British  labor  truce 

The  labor  aspect  of  the  War  in  America  has  been 
very  different  from  that  seen  in  Great  Britain.  There, 
a  great  body  of  trade  conditions  had  been  built  up  as 
a  result  of  many  decades  of  patient  and  resolute  effort. 
Forty-five  per  cent  of  the  male  working  population  of 
Great  Britain  belong  to  labor  unions.  The  leaders  are 
prominent  national  figures.  Labor  in  Great  Britain 
was,  even  before  the  War,  on  the  way  to  a  position  of 
dominance.  It  had  already  the  beginnings  of  a  char- 
ter. So  many  and  so  great  were  the  concessions  that 
had  been  secured  from  capital,  that  the  industries  of 
the  nation  were  not  sufficiently  elastic  to  meet  the 
demands  for  war  production.  By  the  terms  of  the 
famous  "Treasury  Agreement"  of  March,  1915,  the 
majority  of  the  larger  labor  bodies  relinquished  their 
right  to  strike.  The  miners,  led  by  Robert  Smillie, 
stayed  out  of  the  agreement,  and  after  fifteen  months 
the  great  labor  bodies  which  had  signed  it  decided  to 
break  the  truce.  Labor  was  suspicious  of  the  often 
repeated  pledges  of  the  Government  to  restore  trade 
union  conditions,  which  had  been  surrendered  in  the 
interest  of  winning  the  War.  It  became  more  and 
more  apparent  that  the  sweeping  changes  due  to  the 
introduction  of  new  machinery  and  new  methods,  the 
development  of  new  processes,  and  the  greatly  in- 
creased participation  of  women  in  industry  could 
never  be  entirely  abandoned.  In  place  of  the  demand 
for  restoration  of  the  status  quo  appeared  specific  de- 
mands regarding  wages,  hours,  and  management. 


32        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

The  American  contrast 

In  America,  on  the  other  hand,  labor  enjoyed  no 
such  industrial  charter.  The  country  is  young  and 
labor  is  undisciplined  and,  in  large  part,  is  as  yet 
unconvinced  of  the  value  of  organization.  Probably 
less  than  one-fifth  of  the  male  workers  eligible  for 
union  membership  were  organized  prior  to  the  War. 
Women  workers,  save  in  the  garment  trades,  have  not 
been  an  important  factor  in  labor  activities.  As  a 
result  of  this  scant  organization,  standards  have  been 
fluid,  experimental,  and  far  from  uniform.  Strikes 
have  been  abundant.  During  1916,  the  last  pre-war 
year,  2,495  strikes  were  reported  in  twenty  industries. 

A  friendly  Administration 

When  war  was  declared,  the  Administration 
promptly  took  advantage  of  England's  experience  and 
secured  for  organized  labor  practically  everything 
that  it  asked.  The  threatened  railway  tie-up  of  191 6, 
by  which  the  Railroad  Brotherhoods  obtained  from 
Congress  the  Adamson  basic  eight-hour  law,  was  no 
doubt  the  psychological  background  for  labor's  rela- 
tions with  the  Government  during  the  War.  President 
Wilson  had  made  many  liberal  utterances  on  the  labor 
question  and  Secretary  Baker,  who  is  the  President  of 
the  National  Consumers'  League,  is  an  open  champion 
of  labor  rights.  It  is  not  strange  that  all  these  factors 
conspired  to  establish  a  partnership  between  organized 
labor  and  the  Government.  Nearly  a  million  mem- 
bers were  added  in  a  year  to  the  A.  F.  of  L.  Unions 
are  becoming  fashionable.  The  teachers  and  actors 
are  organizing  and  vigorously  asserting  themselves. 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     33 

The  War  Labor  Board 

The  creation  of  the  War  Labor  Board,  with  ex- 
President  Taft  and  Frank  P.  Walsh  as  joint  chairmen, 
not  only  stabilized  industry  during  the  War,  but  went 
far  toward  bringing  workers  and  employers  to  a  basis 
of  understanding  and  setting  national  standards  for  the 
settlement  of  labor  disputes.  At  the  same  time  the 
importance  of  the  Government  as  an  employer  was  not 
overlooked.  The  War  Labor  Policies  Board,  presided 
over  by  Professor  Felix  Frankfurter,  was  less  discussed 
in  the  press  than  the  War  Labor  Board,  but  was  per- 
haps no  less  important.  Much  progress  was  made 
toward  the  development  of  a  national  labor  policy. 
The  attitude  of  the  Government  is  illustrated  in  the 
provision  for  re-training  war  cripples.  Every  man 
who  suffered  more  than  a  ten  per  cent  disability  is 
given  full  trade  or  professional  training  at  the  Gov- 
ernment's expense.  An  advance  position  was  taken 
in  reference  to  women  by  the  creation  of  a  Women  in 
Industry  service  under  the  direction  of  Mary  Van 
Kleeck,  who  became  a  member  of  the  War  Labor 
Policies  Board.  The  permanent  maintenance  of  this 
service  is  one  of  the  most  urgent  matters  now  awaiting 
decision  by  Congress.  The  War  Labor  Board  has  died 
of  starvation. 

A  new  labor  consciousness 

Thus,  while  in  Great  Britain  labor  was  making 
unprecedented  sacrifices,  in  America  labor  was  having 
its  day.  Both  here  and  in  Great  Britain,  however, 
and  on  the  Continent  as  well,  it  is  apparent  that  an 
outstanding  result  of  the  War  has  been  a  new  sense  on 
the  part  of  labor  of  its  own  dignity  and  worth.     In 


34        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

order  to  keep  production  of  ammunition,  ships,  and 
food  at  top  speed,  we  have  told  the  industrial  worker 
that  he  was  a  partner  of  the  soldier  and  sailor  in  the 
great  enterprise  of  winning  the  War.  It  is  not  strange 
that  he  came  to  believe  it.  It  was  stated  in  June, 
1918,  by  an  executive  of  the  British  Miners'  Federa- 
tion that,  with  a  shortage  in  production  from  the 
French  coal  mines  of  800,000  tons  a  month,  the  British 
miners  could  end  the  War  in  nine  days  by  laying  down 
their  tools!  In  the  spring  of  191 9  the  miners  actually 
threatened  to  tie  up  every  industry  in  Great  Britain, 
if  their  demands  for  increased  pay  and  shorter  hours 
were  not  met.  The  assertion  of  labor  rights,  backed 
by  solid  economic  power,  has  never  been  so  insistent 
or  so  potent  as  now.  The  guns  had  scarcely  ceased 
firing  when  a  prominent  employer,  by  announcing 
that  labor  must  be  reconciled  to  a  reduction  in  wages, 
drew  the  fire  of  Samuel  Gompers,  who  threatened  such 
an  efifort  with  the  resistance  of  all  the  economic  power 
of  American  labor.  The  present  temper  of  the  more 
aggressive  union  labor  organizations  in  this  country  is 
illustrated  by  the  refusal  of  the  employes  of  the  Willys- 
Overland  Company  in  Toledo  to  work  longer  than 
forty-eight  hours  a  week,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the 
company  had  but  two  weeks  previously  distributed 
$400,000  under  its  new  profit-sharing  plan.  The  union 
men  describe  the  plan  as  "50-50 — after  the  company 
gets  theirs." 

Plight  of  the  unorganized 

But  recognition  of  enormous  gains  and  the  corre- 
sponding increase  in  the  strength  of  labor  should  not 
close  one's  eyes  to  the  alarming  condition  of  unor- 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     35 

ganized  workers,  particularly  women.  The  figures 
reported  in  connection  with  the  Lawrence  strike 
make  it  perfectly  clear  that  multitudes  of  workers 
could  not  possibly  live  on  their  own  earnings.  Recent 
investigations  in  New  York  City  and  State  show  wages 
for  women  far  below  the  line  of  comfortable  living,  in 
spite  of  hours,  in  many  cases,  that  are  insufferably  long. 

The  Government  line-up 

An  odd  and  significant  effect  of  the  War,  both  in 
America  and  in  Great  Britain,  has  been  to  bring  the 
Governments  into  alignment  with  "regular"  organized 
labor  as  against  the  activities  of  the  more  radical  ele- 
ments. In  the  great  Clyde  strike  in  the  engineering 
trades  in  the  spring  of  1916,  the  shop  stewards  of  the 
Amalgamated  Society  of  Engineers  became  dissatis- 
fied with  the  conduct  of  their  trade  union  and  under- 
took to  handle  the  situation  for  themselves.  Skilled 
tradesmen  were  being  replaced  by  semi-skilled  and 
unskilled  women  workers — a  process  known  as  the 
"dilution"  of  labor — and  the  newcomers  were  under- 
cutting the  union  wage  scales.  Trade  union  officials 
bound  by  the  Treasury  Agreement,  which  made 
strikes  illegal  and  arbitration  compulsory,  found  no 
way  to  abate  the  grievance,  and  the  shop  stewards, 
led  by  one  David  Kirkwood,  organized  a  strike,  "on 
their  own,"  as  the  English  say.  This  amounted  to 
insurrection,  and  made  it  possible  for  Mr.  Lloyd 
George  to  attack  the  radicals  as  "enemies  of  organized 
labor."  It  was  a  strange  experience  for  British  trade 
unionists  to  be  vigorously  defended  by  a  Coalition 
premier!  In  America  the  same  situation  has  resulted. 
The    necessity    of    a    disciplined,    conservative,    and 


36        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

wholly  trustworthy  body  of  labor  that  would  cooper- 
ate with  the  Government  program  exalted  the  Ameri- 
can Federation  of  Labor  to  an  unprecedented  degree. 
If  Samuel  Gompers  had  been  a  member  of  the  Cabinet 
he  could  not  have  exercised  more  influence.  In  Law- 
rence, in  Seattle,  and  elsewhere,  organized  labor  has 
allied  itself  with  the  conservative  "law  and  order" 
elements  and  has  opposed  radical  propaganda  as 
vigorously  as  has  the  Department  of  Justice.  As  for 
employers,  it  was  easy  during  the  War  for  them  to  be 
generous.  Many  were  operating  on  a  "cost  plus" 
basis.  High  wages  went  into  "cost"  and  never  inter- 
fered with  the  "plus."  Profiteering  has  been  wide- 
spread and  the  beneficiaries  of  inflated  trade  could 
afford  to  keep  organized  labor  contented.  Finally, 
the  tremendous  increase  in  government  employment 
has  taken  labor  demands  out  of  the  field  of  private 
controversy. 

The  crisis  in  Britain 

The  situation  in  Great  Britain  was  seen  by  the  Gov- 
ernment to  be  critical  as  early  as  the  summer  of  1917, 
when  a  Commission  of  Inquiry  into  Industrial  Unrest 
was  set  in  motion.  Among  the  causes  reported  to 
exist  were  the  following: 

High  food  prices  in  relation  to  wages  and  unequal 
distribution  of  food. 

Restrictions  of  personal  freedom  and,  in  particular 
the  effect  of  the  munitions  of  war  acts.  Workmen 
have  been  tied  up  to  particular  factories  and  have  been 
unable  to  obtain  wages  in  relation  to  their  skill.  In 
many  cases  the  skilled  man's  wage  is  less  than  the 
wage  of  the  unskilled.     .     . 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     37 

Lack  of  confidence  in  the  government.  This  is  due 
to  the  surrender  of  trade-union  customs  and  the  feehng 
that  promises  as  regards  their  restoration  will  not  be 
kept.    .    .    . 

Delay  in  settlement  of  disputes.  In  some  instances 
ten  weeks  have  elapsed  without  a  settlement,  and 
after  a  strike  has  taken  place  the  matter  has  been  put 
right  in  a  few  days. 

Lack  of  housing  in  certain  areas. 

Industrial  fatigue. 

Lack  of  proper  organization  amongst  the  unions. 

Inconsiderate  treatment  of  women,  whose  wages  are 
sometimes  as  low  as  thirteen  shillings. 

More  startling  was  the  pronouncement  of  the  Gar- 
ton  Foundation,  in  its  "Memorandum"  now  recognized 
as  one  of  the  significant  documents  of  the  War: 

"Many  of  the  men  who  return  from  the  trenches  to 
the  great  munition  and  shipbuilding  centers  are,  with- 
in a  few  weeks  of  their  return,  among  those  who  exhibit 
most  actively  their  discontent  with  present  conditions. 
To  a  very  large  number  of  men  now  in  the  ranks,  the 
fight  against  Germany  is  a  fight  against  'Prussian- 
ism,'  and  the  spirit  of  Prussianism  represents  to  them 
only  an  extreme  example  of  that  to  which  they  object 
in  the  industrial  and  social  institutions  of  their  own 
country.  They  regard  the  present  struggle  as  closely 
connected  with  the  campaign  against  capitalist  and 
class-domination  at  home." 

The  Reconstruction  Committee  of  the  British  Gov- 
ernment had  already  appointed  a  sub-committee 
known,  from  the  name  of  its  chairman,  as  the  Whitley 
Committee,  to  inquire  into  "relations  between  em- 
ployers and  employed."  This  committee  was  charged 
not  only  with  discovering  methods  of  improving  indus- 
trial relations,  but  with  devising  a  permanent  plan  for 
"review  of  industrial  conditions  by  those  concerned." 


38        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

The  Whitley  plan 

The  Whitley  Committee  made,  in  all,  five  reports  to 
the  Government — the  first  in  March,  191 7,  and  the 
last  in  June,  1918.  Its  plan  called  for  national  indus- 
trial councils,  district  councils,  and  works  committees 
for  each  industry  in  which  both  employers  and  workers 
are  well  organized.  The  committee  hesitated  to  re- 
commend the  plan  for  industries  where  organization  is 
far  from  complete.  In  adopting  the  Whitley  plan,  the 
Government  has  given  the  most  explicit  endorsement 
of  trade  union  structure  and  method.  The  works 
committees  and  industrial  councils  have  equal  repre- 
sentation from  employers  and  workmen. 

Among  the  specific  proposals  made  for  the  func- 
tioning of  the  industrial  councils  are:  the  better  utili- 
zation of  the  practical  knowledge  and  experience  of  the 
working  people;  the  establishment  of  regular  methods 
of  negotiation  and  the  settlement  of  principles  govern- 
ing wages  and  their  readjustment,  so  as  to  give  labor  a 
share  in  increasing  prosperity  and  productivity;  the 
assurance  of  greater  steadiness  of  earnings  and  em- 
ployment to  the  workers;  the  provision  for  increased 
research  and  technical  training.  The  committee 
recorded  its  conviction  that  in  each  industry  there  was 
a  sufficiently  large  body  of  opinion  ready  to  adopt  its 
proposals. 

In  a  report  on  conciliation  and  arbitration,  the 
committee  rejected  compulsory  arbitration  as  dis- 
tasteful to  both  parties  in  industry,  and  condemned 
any  scheme  of  conciliation  that  involves  the  suspension 
of  a  strike  or  lockout  already  begun.  Voluntary  con- 
ciliation and  arbitration  are  favored. 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     39 

Progress  toward  industrial  peace 

Spurred  on  by  growing  industrial  unrest,  the  British 
Government  brought  the  Whitley  recommendations 
before  the  several  sections  of  its  Commission  of  In- 
quiry into  Industrial  Unrest.  Their  reception  of  them 
was  favorable,  as  was  the  general  response  of  employ- 
ers' and  labor  organizations,  and  the  formation  of 
councils  went  forward  rapidly.  The  first  industries  to 
be  organized  on  the  Whitley  plan  were  pottery, 
building,  heavy  chemicals,  gold,  silver,  and  kindred 
trades,  rubber  and  silk,  baking  and  furniture.  The 
Employers'  Industrial  Commission  of  the  United 
States  Department  of  Labor,  which  studied  labor  con- 
ditions abroad  in  February  and  March,  1919,  found 
beginnings  of  the  National  Industrial  Council  plan  in 
thirty  industries.  And,  which  is  quite  as  significant, 
the  Government  has  undertaken  to  apply  the  Whitley 
plan  in  its  essentials  to  its  own  industrial  establish- 
ments. 

A  national  industrial  conference 

The  British  Government,  in  February,  1919,  called 
a  National  Industrial  Conference  of  employers  and 
employes,  which  appointed  a  "Joint  Provisional  Indus- 
trial Committee,"  and  arranged  to  meet  again  within 
a  few  weeks  to  hear  this  committee's  report.  Employ- 
ers and  workers  were  equally  represented  on  the 
committee,  which  included  both  men  and  women. 
The  report,  which  has  now  been  adopted  by  the  Con- 
ference, is  an  epoch-marking  document.  It  calls  for 
enforced  national  minimum  wage  scales,  a  forty-eight 
hour  week,  to  be  departed  from  only  by  mutual  agree- 


40        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

ment,  obligatory  recognition  of  trade  unions,  responsi- 
bility of  both  employers  and  working  people  to  their 
accredited  organizations,  and  a  National  Industrial 
Council — a  permanent  "industrial  parliament" — con- 
sisting of  200  employers'  and  200  employes'  represen- 
tatives. This  body  will  be,  presumably,  in  effect  a 
government  institution,  since  Parliament  and  the 
administration  will  almost  necessarily  be  guided  by  its 
advices,  and  will  use  the  Council's  equi-partisan  stand- 
ing committee  of  fifty  as  they  use  the  Ministry  of 
Labor. 

A  new  war  threatened 

Perhaps  even  more  significant  of  the  trend  of 
Britain's  post-war  labor  policy  is  the  adoption  by  the 
Government  of  the  Sankey  report,  emanating  from  the 
Coal  Commission.  A  crisis  developed  in  January, 
1919,  which  threatened  to  tie  up  every  industry  in  the 
United  Kingdom.  The  Miners'  Federation,  800,000 
strong,  presented  an  unprecedented  demand  for  a 
thirty  per  cent  increase  in  wages,  a  six-hour  day — 
exclusive  of  the  time  spent  underground  in  going  to 
and  returning  from  the  coal  pits — and  the  nationali- 
zation of  the  coal  industry.  The  miners  are  part  of  the 
Triple  Alliance — miners,  railwaymen,  and  transport 
workers — and  the  strike  which  they  called  would  have 
produced  the  most  complete  paralysis  in  British  indus- 
trial history.  Upon  the  Government's  offer  to  submit 
the  questions  at  issue  to  a  joint  commission,  which 
should  report  before  March  20,  the  Federation  post- 
poned the  strike  date  to  March  22. 


ORGANIZED  LABOR  AND  THE  WAR     41 

A  revolutionary  report 

Three  reports  presently  appeared,  one  signed  by  the 
workers,  one  by  the  employers,  and  one  by  the  chair- 
man, Mr.  Justice  Sankey,  and  the  representatives  of 
employers  in  general.  The  last  was  accepted,  reducing 
the  working  day  underground  to  seven  hours  with  a 
promised  reduction  to  six  hours  in  192 1,  provided  the 
industry  is  then  in  a  position  to  stand  it;  increasing 
wages  of  adults  two  shillings  a  day  and  of  persons 
under  sixteen,  one  shilling  a  day.  The  report  con- 
templates that  this  increase  be  borne  by  the  industry 
at  the  present  market  rate  for  coal.  On  the  subject  of 
nationalization,  concerning  which  a  later  report  was 
promised,  the  Sankey  document  had  this  to  say: 
"Even  upon  the  evidence  already  given,  the  present 
system  of  ownership  and  working  in  the  coal  industry 
stands  condemned,  and  some  other  system  must  be 
substituted  for  it,  either  nationalization  or  a  method 
of  unification  by  national  purchase  or  by  joint  con- 
trol." 

The  promised  reports  on  nationalization  have  now 
been  submitted.  Mr.  Sankey  and  the  miners  concur 
in  calling  for  immediate  legislation  for  acquisition  by 
the  Government  of  the  mining  properties,  just  com- 
pensation being  made  to  the  legal  owners.  It  is  now 
the  Government's  "move." 

"Bob"  SmiUie 

The  dominant  figure  in  the  Coal  Commission  was 
Robert  Smillie,  head  of  the  Miners'  Federation  with 
800,000  members,  the  strongest  industrial  union  in  the 
world.  He  is  also  the  head  of  the  Triple  Alliance  with 


42        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

1,500,000  affiliated  members.  Smillie  is  apparently 
the  most  popular  labor  leader  in  England.  He  is  a 
socialist — a  member  of  the  Independent  Labor  Party, 
which  has  furnished  much  of  the  radical  leadership  of 
British  labor.  A  titled,  conservative  English  writer 
has  referred  to  Smillie  as  "the  leader  of  the  new  democ- 
racy." He  is  the  embodiment  of  that  idealism  and 
human  passion  that  is  driving  British  labor  forward. 
In  America  we  have  only  occasional  flashes  of  that  fire.^ 

America  waits 

Our  own  Administration  has  avoided  any  thorough- 
going effort  at  reconstructing  industry.  The  anomalies 
of  the  situation  are  as  marked  as  in  Great  Britain,  but 
the  vast  resources  of  the  country,  the  expectation  of  a 
strong  European  market,  our  greatly  improved  posi- 
tion in  reference  to  carrying  trade,  and  the  proposed 
exclusion  of  immigration  for  at  least  two  years — these 
factors  are  counted  on  to  keep  labor  employed,  wages 
high,  and  dividends  satisfying.  However,  the  stimulus 
given  by  the  War  Labor  Board  to  a  more  democratic 
organization  of  industry,  coupled  with  a  natural  ten- 
dency to  copy  successful  experiments  abroad,  is  mak- 
ing for  changes  in  America  in  the  direction  of  progress. 


>  An  admirable  account  of  recent  British  labor  history  will  be 
found  in  "British  Labor  and  the  War,"  by  Paul  V.  Kellogg  and 
Arthur  Gleason,  1919.  For  a  popular  treatment  of  organized 
labor  in  America,  see  "American  Labor  Unions,"  by  Helen 
Marot,  1914. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT 

In  America  the  trade  union  movement  has  avoided 
direct  political  activity.  It  has,  however,  used  its 
economic  power  frequently  for  political  ends.  The 
most  notable  example  is  perhaps  the  forcing  of  the 
Adamson  eight-hour  law  from  the  Government  on  a 
threat  of  the  Railway  Brotherhoods  to  tie  up  transpor- 
tation. It  has  long  been  deemed  important  for  candi- 
dates for  office  on  any  ticket  to  stand  well  with  labor, 
yet  the  policy  of  the  A.  F.  of  L.  under  Mr.  Gompers's 
leadership,  is  antagonistic  to  direct  political  activity. 
The  theory  underlying  this  position  is  that  labor  rep- 
resents, primarily,  economic  power,  and  that  active 
participation  in  politics  will  incur  the  misuse  and  de- 
terioration of  this  power.  The  tendency  in  America 
toward  a  political  labor  party  has  been  inspired  by 
British  developments,  which  we  shall  notice  presently. 

Labor  legislation 

The  achievements  of  labor  through  non-partisan 
political  effort  should  not  be  under-estimated.  In  all 
the  states  laws  have  been  put  on  the  books  by  labor 
influence.  The  application  of  safety  devices,  the  limi- 
tations placed  on  woman  and  child  labor,  the  guar- 
antee of  labor's  right  to  "picket"  in  time  of  strikes,  the 
wide  acceptance  of  the  principle  of  workmen's  com- 
pensation for  injuries — these  are  examples  of  economic 
pressure  successfully  applied  on  the  part  of  labor  to 


44        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

the  law-making  machinery.  Workmen's  compensa- 
tion laws  are  in  force  in  forty-one  states.  The  Federal 
Government  has  made  similar  provision  for  its  million 
employes.  In  the  last  six  years  fourteen  states — all  of 
them  in  the  west  save  Massachusetts — have  adopted 
legislation  aimed  at  establishing  a  minimum  wage  for 
women  and  children. 

Health  insurance 

Labor  is  now  turning  its  attention  to  the  subject 
of  health  insurance.  The  United  States  is  dis- 
tinctly behind  Europe  in  this  matter.  Eleven  Euro- 
pean countries,  including  Great  Britain,  Germany, 
Holland,  and  Russia,  have  compulsory  health  insur- 
ance laws.  A  number  of  states  have  begun  investi- 
gation with  a  view  to  legislation.  Influential  labor 
organizations  throughout  the  country  are  pressing 
this  demand,  with  the  assistance  of  social  workers, 
public  officials,  and  a  large  section  of  the  disinterested 
public.  Another  urgent  matter,  both  from  the  point 
of  view  of  the  public  welfare  and  from  that  of  satisfy- 
ing a  demand  of  labor,  is  the  rehabilitation  of  indus- 
trial cripples.  A  bill  providing  for  the  adaptation  to 
this  end  of  the  machinery  developed  for  re-training 
war  cripples  was  one  of  the  important  measures  which 
the  Sixty-Fifth  Congress  adjourned  without  passing. 

The  British  Labor  party 

The  most  important  recent  event  in  English  politics 
is  the  reorganization  of  the  Labor  party  in  Great 
Britain,  which  makes  it  a  powerful  combination,  for 
political  action,  of  labor  forces  in  the  United  Kingdom. 
The  present  trend  of  American  labor  is  quite  incom- 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    45 

prehensible  save  as  viewed  against  the  background  of 
the  British  labor  movement. 

The  Labor  party  speaks  not  only  for  its  own  con- 
stituency, but  for  the  British  Trades  Union  Congress, 
with  over  4,000,000  members,  and  for  the  British 
Cooperative  Movement,  with  3,500,000.  It  launched 
a  campaign  for  the  formation  of  local  organizations  in 
the  Parliamentary  Constituencies  throughout  Great 
Britain,  and  also  invited  for  the  first  time  the  enrol- 
ment of  individual  members.  It  has  made  a  special 
appeal  to  the  6,000,000  women  voters,  newly  enfran- 
chised, and  it  has  also  declared  that  workers  by  hand 
and  by  brain  are  to  be  recognized  on  equal  terms. 

The  party  itself  has  been  compared  to  a  "holding 
company."  Among  its  constituents  are  the  orthodox 
wing  of  the  British  Socialist  Party,  the  Fabian  Society, 
and  the  Independent  Labor  Party.  It  numbers  more 
than  2,500,000  members.  The  party  represents  the 
vast  majority  of  Britain's  5,000,000  trade  unionists. 

The  secretary  and  leader  of  the  British  Labor  party 
is  Mr.  Arthur  Henderson,  formerly  a  member  of  the 
War  Council,  from  which  he  retired  when  the  breach 
between  organized  labor  and  the  Government  became 
too  wide  to  ignore.  Other  prominent  figures  are  J.  H. 
Thomas,  J.  R.  Clynes,  Ramsay  MacDonald,  M.P., 
Robert  Smillie,  and  PhilipSnowden,  M.P.  Mr.  Sidney 
Webb,  of  the  Fabian  Socialist  Society,  is  credited  with 
the  authorship  of  the  program  upon  which  the  party 
entered  the  elections  in  December,  1918.  Henderson, 
who  had  lately  changed  his  political  residence,  Mac- 
Donald,  and  Showden  were  all  defeated  for  re-election. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  party's  parliamentary  strength 
was  materially  increased  and  it  is  now  the  recognized 


46        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

opposition  group.  The  Sinn  Feiners  (pronounced 
"Sheen  Fainers"),  who  are  the  ultra-nationaHst  Irish 
group,  have  seventy-three  seats  as  against  sixty-five 
of  the  Labor  opposition,  but  the  Sinn  Feiners  are  in 
open  revolt  against  the  Government  and  do  not  occupy 
their  seats  in  Parliament,  Mr.  Henderson's  defeat 
was  presumably  mainly  due  to  his  change  of  constitu- 
ency, in  order  to  be  in  London  where  the  head- 
quarters of  the  party  are  located.  Mr.  Thomas  has 
been  made  chairman  of  the  parliamentary  group.  He 
is  a  man  of  extraordinary  gifts. 

The  now  famous  program  known  as  "Labor  and  the 
New  Social  Order,"  makes  a  radical  attack  upon  the 
existing  industrial  situation: 

"What  this  war  is  consuming  is  not  merely  the  secur- 
ity, the  homes,  the  livelihood,  and  the  lives  of  millions 
of  innocent  families,  and  an  enormous  proportion  of 
all  the  accumulated  wealth  of  the  world,  but  also  the 
very  basis  of  the  peculiar  social  order  in  which  it  has 
arisen.  The  individualist  system  of  capitalist  produc- 
tion, based  on  the  private  ownership  and  competitive 
administration  of  land  and  capital,  with  its  reckless 
'profiteering'  and  wage  slavery  .  .  .  may,  we  hope, 
indeed  have  received  a  death  blow.  With  it  must  go 
the  political  system  and  ideas  in  which  it  naturally 
found  expression.  We  of  the  Labor  party  .  .  .  will 
certainly  lend  no  hand  to  its  revival.  On  the  contrary, 
we  shall  do  our  utmost  to  see  that  it  is  buried  with  the 
millions  whom  it  has  done  to  death." 

As  against  this  old  order  the  program  calls  for  "a 
deliberately  planned  cooperation  in  production  and 
distribution  for  the  benefit  of  all  who  participate  by 
hand  or  by  brain  ...  on  that  equal  freedom,  that 
general   consciousness   of  consent,   and   that  widest 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    47 

possible  participation  in  power,  both  economic  and 
political,  which  is  characteristic  of  democracy." 
i  Upon  the  figure  of  a  four-pillared  house,  the  pro- 

gram is  built  up.  The  four  supports  are  (i)  The  Uni- 
versal Enforcement  of  the  National  Minimum;  (2)The 
Democratic  Control  of  Industry;  (3)  A  Revolution  in 
National  Finance;  and  (4)  The  Surplus  Wealth  for 
the  Common  Good. 

A  national  minimum 

"We  are  members  one  of  another,"  declares  the 
Labor  party — "no  man  liveth  to  himself  alone."  A 
minimum  of  thirty  shillings  ($7.20)  a  week  is  de- 
manded for  all  workers.  This  is,  normally,  equivalent 
to  about  $18  a  week  in  the  United  States.  The  guar- 
anty of  employment  is  declared  to  be  a  government 
obligation:  "It  is  now  known  that  the  Government 
can,  if  it  chooses,  arrange  the  public  works  and  the 
orders  of  national  departments  and  local  authorities  in 
such  a  way  as  to  maintain  the  aggregate  demand  for 
labor  in  the  whole  kingdom  (including  that  of  capi- 
talist employers)  approximately  at  a  uniform  level 
from  year  to  year." 

The  program  points  out  to  the  Government  spe- 
cific works  that  need  to  be  undertaken,  which  will 
absorb  unemployed  labor:  (i)  the  rehousing  of  the 
population  to  the  extent,  possibly,  of  a  million  new 
cottages  and  an  outlay  of  £300,000,000;  (2)  the  im- 
mediate making  good  of  the  shortage  of  schools,  train- 
ing colleges,  and  technical  colleges;  (3)  new  roads; 
(4)  light  railways;  (5)  the  unification  and  reorgani- 
zation of  the  railway  and  canal  system;  (6)  afforesta- 
tion ;  (7)  the  reclamation  of  land ;  (8)  the  development 


48        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

and  better  equipment  of  the  ports  and  harbors;  (9) 
the  opening  up  of  access  to  land  by  cooperative  small 
holdings  and  in  other  practicable  ways. 

Democratic  control  of  industry 

The  Labor  party  is  emphatic  on  this  point: 

"The  first  condition  of  democracy  is  eflfective  personal 
freedom.  This  has  suffered  so  many  encroachments 
during  the  War  that  it  is  necessary  to  state  with  clear- 
ness that  the  complete  removal  of  all  the  wartime 
restrictions  on  freedom  of  speech,  freedom  of  publica- 
tion, freedom  of  the  press,  freedom  of  travel,  and  free- 
dom of  choice  of  place  of  residence  and  kind  of  em- 
ployment must  take  place  the  day  after  peace  is 
declared.  The  party  stands  for  the  complete  abolition 
of  the  House  of  Lords,  and  for  a  most  strenuous  oppo- 
sition to  any  new  Second  Chamber,  whether  elected  or 
not,  having  in  it  any  element  of  heredity  or  privilege, 
or  of  the  control  of  the  House  of  Commons  by  any 
party  or  class.  But  unlike  the  Conservative  and  Lib- 
eral parties,  the  Labor  party  insists  on  democracy  in 
industry  as  well  as  in  government.  It  demands  the 
progressive  elimination  from  the  control  of  industry  of 
the  private  capitalist,  individual,  or  joint-stock;  and 
the  setting  free  of  all  who  work,  whether  by  hand  or  by 
brain,  for  the  service  of  the  community,  and  of  the 
community  only." 

The  program  calls  for  the  immediate  nationalization 
of  railways,  mines,  and  electrical  power  production. 

A  new  system  of  finance 

"Too  long,"  says  the  Labor  party,  "has  our  national 
finance  been  regulated,  contrary  to  the^  teaching  of 
political  economy,  according  to  the  wishes  of  the 
possessing  classes  and  the  profits  of  the  financiers. 
The  colossal  expenditure  involved  in  the  present  war 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    49 

(of  which,  against  the  protest  of  the  Labor  party, 
only  a  quarter  has  been  raised  by  taxation,  whilst 
three-quarters  have  been  borrowed  at  onerous  rates  of 
interest,  to  be  a  burden  on  the  nation's  future) 
brings  things  to  a  crisis. 

"Meanwhile  innumerable  new  private  fortunes  are 
being  heaped  up  by  those  who  have  taken  advantage 
of  the  nation's  needs;  and  the  one- tenth  of  the  popula- 
tion which  owns  nine-tenths  of  the  riches  of  the 
United  Kingdom,  far  from  being  made  poorer,  will 
find  itself,  in  the  aggregate,  as  a  result  of  the  war, 
drawing  in  rent  and  interest  and  dividends  a  larger 
nominal  income  than  ever  before.  Such  a  position 
demands  a  revolution  in  national  finance.  .  .  .  For 
the  raising  of  the  greater  part  of  the  revenue  now 
required  the  Labor  party  looks  to  the  direct  taxation 
of  incomes  above  the  necessary  cost  of  family  mainte- 
nance; and  for  the  requisite  effort  to  pay  off  the 
national  debt,  to  the  direct  taxation  of  private 
fortunes  both  during  life  and  at  death." 

"Surplus  for  the  common  good" 

"One  main  pillar  of  thehouse  that  the  Labor  party 
intends  to  build  is  the  future  appropriation  of  the 
surplus,  not  to  the  enlargement  of  any  individual 
fortune,  but  to  the  common  good.  It  is  from  this 
constantly  arising  surplus  (to  be  secured,  on  the  one 
hand,  by  nationalization  and  municipalization,  and, 
on  the  other,  by  the  steeply  graduated  taxation  of 
private  income  and  riches)  that  will  have  to  be  found 
the  new  capital  which  the  community  day  by  day 
needs  for  the  perpetual  improvement  and  increase  of 
its  various  enterprises,  for  which  we  shall  decline  to  be 
dependent  on  the  usury-exacting  financiers." 

An  interesting  provision  is  that  made  for  scientific 
investigation  and  research:  "not  to  say  also  for  the 
promotion  of  music,  literature,  and  fine  art,  which 
have  been  under  capitalism  so  greatly  neglected.  .  .  . 
Society,  like  the  individual,  does  not  live  by  bread 


50        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

alone — does  not  exist  only  for  perpetual  wealth 
production.  .  .  .  The  Labor  party,  as  the  party  of 
the  producers  by  hand  or  by  brain,  most  distinctively 
marks  itself  off  from  the  older  political  parties, 
standing,  as  these  do,  essentially  for  the  maintenance, 
unimpaired,  of  the  perpetual  private  mortgage  upon 
the  annual  product  of  the  nation  that  is  involved  in 
the  individual  ownership  of  land  and  capital." 

The  "street  of  tomorrow" 

With  the  completion  of  its  "house"  the  Labor  party 
considers  the  street  in  which  it  is  to  stand — the  inter- 
national relations  of  the  democratized  State: 

"As  regards  our  relations  to  foreign  countries,  we 
disavow  and  disclaim  any  desire  or  intention  to  dis- 
possess or  to  impoverish  any  other  state  or  nation. 
We  seek  no  increase  of  territory.  We  disclaim  all 
idea  of  'economic  war.*  We  ourselves  object  to  all 
protective  customs  tariffs;  but  we  hold  that  each 
nation  must  be  left  free  to  do  what  it  thinks  best  for 
its  own  economic  development,  without  thought  of 
injuring  others.  We  believe  that  nations  are  in  no 
way  damaged  by  each  other's  economic  prosperity 
or  commercial  progress;  but,  on  the  contrary,  that 
they  are  actually  themselves  mutually  enriched  there- 
by. We  would  therefore  put  an  end  to  the  old  en- 
tanglements and  mystifications  of  secret  diplomacy 
and  the  formation  of  leagues  against  leagues." 

At  its  summer  meeting  in  1919  the  Labor  party 
called  on  the  Government  to  discontinue  its  policy  of 
hostility  to  Russia.  Its  proposal  that  the  Trades 
Union  Congress  undertake  by  industrial  action  to  pro- 
test against  that  policy  is  indicative  not  only  of  the 
radical  temper,  but  of  the  international  spirit,  of  the 
party. 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    51 

Cooperation 

Almost  equally  significant  with  the  Labor  party 
is  the  cooperative  movement,  which,  with  the  party 
and  the  Trades  Union  Congress,  completes  the 
"trinity"  of  British  labor.  The  Cooperative  Union 
represents  consumers'  enterprises  mainly,  but  it  is 
of  vast  significance  to  labor.  There  were,  in  191 6, 
1,390  consumers'  and  108  producers'  societies.  The 
employes  numbered  148,000.  They  are  organized, 
but  disputes  are  rare.  The  Union  seeks  to  control 
prices  by  becoming  the  largest  buyer  and  by  owning 
the  necessary  shipping  to  command  the  supply  of 
raw  materials.  The  Cooperative  is  said  on  good 
authority  to  cater  directly  or  indirectly  to  about  one- 
third  of  the  population.  The  shareholders  pay 
market  prices  at  the  stores,  but  secure  their  advan- 
tage in  the  distribution  of  profits.  One  town  of 
2,500  inhabitants  is  composed  entirely  of  cooperators, 
who  have  applied  the  principle  not  only  to  necessities 
but  to  the  theater  and  the  motion  picture  house. 

In  the  United  States  the  cooperative  movement  has 
been  slow  to  develop,  but  has  made  rapid  strides 
during  the  War.  The  Cooperative  League  of  America 
reports  2,000  societies,  and  there  are  many  others  not 
so  recorded.  The  states  of  Pennsylvania,  Illinois, 
California,  and  Washington  have  notable  develop- 
ments under  way.^ 

American  labor  in  politics 

In  America  a  labor  party  is  in  the  process  of  forma- 
tion.    It  is  having  its  birth  within  the  trade  union 


See  the  Intercollegiate  Socialist  for  April-May,  19 19. 


52        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

movement,  not  by  authorization  of  the  Federation  of 
Labor,  but  by  the  crystalHzation  of  radical  elements 
within  trade  union  bodies.  The  city  of  New  York 
has  now  an  organization  known  as  "The  American 
Labor  Party  of  Greater  New  York,"  which  represents 
the  central  labor  unions,  the  Women's  Trade  Union 
League,  and  the  United  Hebrew  Trades.  The  party 
put  forward  in  the  spring  of  19 19  an  extensive  program 
similar  in  content  to  that  of  the  British  Labor  party. 

The  Illinois  Labor  party,  which  is  the  first  state 
labor  party  to  appear  in  connection  with  the  new 
movement,  had  its  first  contest  in  the  Chicago  spring 
elections  of  191 9  and  polled  about  54,000  votes. 
Labor  parties  are  organizing  in  a  number  of  states 
and  it  is  estimated  that  there  are  beginnings  of  a  politi- 
cal labor  movement  in  200  cities.  The  convention  of 
the  American  Federation  of  Labor  in  June,  1919, 
passed  a  mild  resolution,  disapproving  the  formation 
of  labor  parties,  but  no  contest  developed.  The 
leaders  of  the  political  movement  express  indifference 
to  the  attitude  of  labor  officials. 

A  labor  party  has  been  formed  in  Canada,  and  is 
cooperating  with  the  United  Farmers'  Association. 
The  movement  is  likely  to  effect  a  close  alignment 
with  that  of  labor  in  the  United  States. 

The  Non-Partisan  League 

Not  least  among  the  significant  political  tendencies 
in  the  United  States  is  the  Non-Partisan  League, 
which  controls  North  Dakota  and  is  on  the  way  to 
control  in  several  other  states  in  the  northwest.  It  is 
represented  in  a  score  of  states  and  has  become  a 
very  considerable  national  political  force.    The  League 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    53 

had  its  origin  in  a  history  of  corrupt  politics  which, 
while  perhaps  not  unique,  particularly  afflicted  the 
farmers  of  the  state.  The  legislature  obstinately  re- 
fused to  be  governed  by  the  popular  mandate  in  1914 
for  state-owned  terminal  elevators.  The  following 
year  the  agricultural  forces  began  to  mobilize  for 
action,  and  in  the  primary  election  of  1916  the  newly 
formed  League  captured  the  Republican  ticket.  In 
November,  191 8,  it  swept  the  state  on  a  platform 
calling  for  state-owned  elevators,  flour  mills,  and 
storage  plants;  a  state  bank  from  which  the  farmers 
can  secure  first  mortgage  loans  at  low  rates  instead  of 
the  exorbitant  charges  to  which  they  have  been  sub- 
jected ;  a  state  building  association  to  aid  farmers  and 
industrial  workers  in  building  dwellings;  state  hail 
insurance;  workmen's  compensation;  the  initiative 
and  referendum;  and  the  exemption  from  taxation  of 
improvements  upon  land.  In  June,  1919,  the  League 
carried  a  legislative  referendum  on  the  eight  laws 
designed  to  put  this  radical  program  into  effect. 

As  its  name  indicates,  the  Non-Partisan  League  is 
not  a  political  party  and  cannot  put  a  ticket  into  the 
field.  It  uses  the  party  which  will  nominate  candi- 
dates that  it  approves,  and  its  influence  is  so  great 
where  it  is  well  organized  that  it  dominates  the  pri- 
mary elections  in  which  candidates  are  chosen.  The 
League's  program  is  revolutionary  in  the  general 
direction  of  state  socialism,  yet  there  has  been  little 
affinity  between  the  Socialist  party  of  North  Dakota 
and  the  League.  An  understanding  was  reached  by 
the  League  in  191 6  with  the  Agricultural  Workers' 
Organization,  to  which  most  of  the  farm  labor  of  the 
state   belonged,   which   virtually   ended   the   serious 


54        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

labor  troubles  that  had  been  prevalent.  The  Agri- 
cultural Workers'  Organization  is  affiliated  with  the 
I.  W.  W.    The  League  headquarters  are  in  St.  Paul. 

The  Socialist  parties 

We  have  already  seen  how  the  socialist  movement 
in  Great  Britain  has  found  expression  through  the 
British  Labor  party. 

United  States:  The  Socialist  party  in  America  has 
been,  until  recently,  the  most  distinctively  political  of 
all  parties,  in  that  it  has  maintained  one  political 
principle,  as  its  platform,  throughout  its  history.  The 
outstanding  characteristic  of  American  politics  is  the 
dearth  of  thorough-going  and  consistent  adherence  to 
political  doctrines  by  the  major  political  parties.  'The 
quest  of  issues  seems  to  prevail  over  the  desire  for 
constructive  political  effort.  Against  this  tradition 
the  Socialist  party  stands  in  significant  contrast. 
The  chief  organ  of  the  party  is  the  New  York  Call. 

The  most  recent  congressional  platform  of  the  party 
bears  marked  resemblance  to  the  British  Labor  party's 
program.  At  the  same  time,  the  Socialist  party  is  so 
firm  in  its  adherence  to  the  principle  of  state  owner- 
ship on  the  one  hand,  and  to  the  Marxian  philosophy 
on  the  other,  that  much  of  the  most  significant  radical 
thinking  in  America  has  sprung  from  other  than 
strictly  Socialist  soil.  (See  Chapter  V.)  The  Social- 
ist party  now  reports  something  over  100,000  mem- 
bers. This  membership  represents,  however,  much 
less  than  the  real  numerical  strength  of  the  party.  Its 
membership  is  on  a  dues-paying  basis  and  the  party 
requires  of  every  member  a  pledge  to  support  its  plat- 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    55 

form  and  its  candidates.  This  prevents  many  persons 
of  socialist  convictions  from  voting  with  the  party  and 
it  is  always  impossible  to  predict  the  strength  of  the 
Socialist  vote.  In  New  York,  for  example,  in  the 
mayoralty  election  of  1917,  Morris  Hillquit,  the  Social 
ist  candidate,  polled  142,000  votes.  In  a  presidential 
campaign  the  party  has  registered  as  many  as  900,000 
votes.  The  majority  Socialists  have  consistently  re- 
pudiated the  War,  holding  that  international  con- 
flicts are  but  the  inevitable  result  of  the  capitalist 
system.  This  has  caused  a  defection  in  Socialist  ranks 
of  many  of  the  most  prominent  party  leaders  and 
writers.  An  insurgent  "left-wing"  movement  has  ap- 
peared in  the  wake  of  the  War,  having  close  affinities 
with  the  communists  of  Russia  (Bolsheviki).  This 
group  is  as  much  scorned  by  the  "regulars"  as  it  is 
feared  by  conservative  interests.  As  to  the  future 
strength  of  the  party,  probably  much  will  depend 
upon  the  relation  which  develops  between  it  and  the 
American  Labor  party,  assuming  that  the  Labor  party 
becomes  a  movement  of  the  strength  which  is  now 
indicated.  The  American  Labor  party  is  leaving  the 
way  open  for  liaison  with  the  Socialist  party,  although 
it  will  have  no  dealings  with  the  old  line  political 
parties.  The  leaders  of  the  two  movements  are  divided 
as  to  the  proper  procedure,  but  the  majority  of  opinion 
seems  to  be  in  favor  of  close  relations. 

Germany:  In  Germany  the  Social  Democratic  party 
was,  before  the  War,  the  strongest  political  labor  or- 
ganization in  the  world.  It  had  over  a  million  mem- 
bers in  1914.  Its  chief  organ  Vorwdrts  (Forw^ard)  is 
one  of  the  most  influential  papers  in  Germany.  In 
1914  the  party  controlled  eighty-six  daily  papers.     It 


56        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

had  III  members  of  the  Reichstag,  the  largest  single 
group  in  that  body. 

France:  In  France  the  United  Socialist  party  se- 
cured, in  1914,  102  seats  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies. 
The  socialists  also  control  many  municipalities. 
French  labor  is  so  strongly  syndicalist  that  the  out- 
standing political  socialists — Briand,  Viviani,  Sembat, 
Guesde,  Thomas — have  had  more  "bourgeois"  than 
strictly  socialist  connections.  The  socialist  organ 
UHumanite  has  a  considerable  influence. 

Italy:  The  Italian  Socialist  party  is  not  very  strong 
in  numbers,  and  is  largely  middle  class.  Yet  in  Italy 
the  Socialists  have  notably  preserved  the  working 
class  consciousness  which  was  opposed  to  the  War. 
Italy  also  has  a  vigorous  syndicalist  movement. 

Russian  Socialism  is  so  distinctively  a  part  of  the 
industrial  revolutionary  movement  that  it  will  be 
discussed  under  the  head  of  Syndicalism. 

Labor  and  the  League  of  Nations 

Since  1900  there  has  been  an  International  Asso- 
ciation for  Labor  Legislation,  with  affiliated  branches 
in  twenty-five  countries.  By  the  terms  of  the  Cove- 
nant of  the  League  of  Nations  there  will  be,  at  the 
seat  of  the  League,  an  international  labor  office.  The 
signatory  powers,  while  not  bound  to  a  specific  pro- 
gram, will  undertake  to  establish  by  appropriate  legis- 
lation the  following  principles : 

1.  In  right  and  in  fact  the  labor  of  a  human  being 
should  not  be  treated  as  merchandise  or  an  article  of 
commerce. 

2.  Employers  and  workers  should  be  allowed 
the  right  of  association  for  all  lawful  purposes. 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    57 

3.  No  child  should  be  permitted  to  be  employed 
in  industry  or  commerce  before  the  age  of  fourteen 
years.  In  order  that  every  child  may  be  insured 
reasonable  opportunities  for  mental  and  physical 
education  between  the  years  of  fourteen  and  eighteen, 
young  persons  of  either  sex  may  only  be  employed 
on  work  which  is  not  harmful  to  their  physical 
development  and  on  condition  that  the  continuation 
of  their  technical  or  general  education  is  insured. 

4.  Every  worker  has  a  right  to  a  wage  adequate  to 
maintain  a  reasonable  standard  of  life,  having  regard 
to  the  civilization  of  his  time  and  country. 

5.  Equal  pay  should  be  given  to  women  and  to 
men  for  work  of  equal  value  in  quantity  and  quality. 

6.  A  weekly  rest,  including  Sunday  or  its  equiva- 
lent, for  all  workers, 

7.  Limitation  of  the  hours  of  labor  in  industry  on 
the  basis  of  eight  hours  a  day,  or  forty-eight  hours  a 
week,  subject  to  an  exception  for  countries  in  which 
climatic  conditions,  the  imperfect  development  of 
industrial  organization,  or  other  special  circumstances 
render  the  industrial  efficiency  of  the  workers  sub- 
stantially different.  The  International  Labor  Con- 
ference will  recommend  a  basis  approximately  equival- 
ent to  the  above  for  adoption  in  such  countries. 

8.  In  all  matters  concerning  their  status  as  workers 
and  social  insurance,  foreign  workmen  lawfully  ad- 
mitted to  any  country,  and  their  families,  should  be 
insured  the  same  treatment  as  the  nationals  of  that 
country. 

9.  All  states  should  institute  a  system  of  inspection, 
in  which  women  should  take  part,  in  order  to  insure 
the  enforcement  of  the  laws  and  regulations  for  the 
protection  of  the  workers. 

These  nine  points  represent,  from  the  labor  point 
of  view,  a  minimum  program.  Mr.  Gompers,  who 
was  chairman  of  the  Labor  Commission  of  the  Peace 


58        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

Conference,  has  frankly  admitted  that  American  labor 
has  little  to  gain  from  it.  Working  conditions  in  the 
United  States  are  far  in  advance  of  those  in  Europe, 
Mr.  Gompers  considered  the  work  of  the  American 
labor  commissioners  as  a  missionary  enterprise. 

It  is  of  more  than  passing  significance,  however, 
that  labor  has  been  given  a  position  of  prime  impor- 
tance by  provision  within  the  League  Covenant  for 
the  beginnings  of  an  international  labor  charter.  The 
labor  ofhce  will  have  twelve  members  chosen  by  gov- 
ernments, six  chosen  by  employers  and  six  by  labor. 
An  international  labor  conference  will  be  held  annually 
— the  first  session  in  Washington  in  October,  19 19. 

The  "International" 

At  the  present  moment  it  can  scarcely  be  said  that 
there  is  an  international  political  labor  movement. 
There  is  a  dormant  organization,  however,  known  as 
the  "International,"  which  is  the  descendant  of  the 
Communist  League  formed  by  Karl  Marx  and  his 
associates  in  1847.  It  was  from  this  organization  that 
the  famous  Communist  Manifesto  issued.  The 
League  was  short  lived,  as  was  the  International  As- 
sociation of  Working  Men,  organized  in  1862.  In  1889, 
the  centenary  year  of  the  French  Revolution,  an  inter- 
national socialist  congress  was  held  in  Paris.  Succes- 
sive congresses  were  held  until  the  International 
Socialist  Bureau  was  formed  in  1900.  This  is  the 
organization  which  the  War  has  left  virtually  dormant. 
Membership  in  this  Bureau  was  open  to: 

I.  All  associations  which  adhere  to  the  essential 
principles  of  socialism:  socialization  of  the  means  of 
production  and  distribution;  international  union  and 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    59 

action  by  the  workers;  a  political  class  struggle  by  the 
proletariat  of  the  world. 

2.  All  organizations  which  accept  these  principles, 
even  though  they  do  not  participate  in  political  action. 

Twenty-eight  countries  have  organizations  affiliated 
to  this  Bureau.  It  met  once  a  year,  until  the  War,  in 
Brussels.  Its  secretary,  Camille  Huysmans,  and  its 
chairman,  Emile  Vandervelde,  are  outstanding  figures 
in  international  socialism. 

Many  attempts  have  been  made  by  national  labor 
bodies  to  hold  an  international  congress  of  labor  dele- 
gates during  the  War,  but  all  without  success.  Inter- 
Allied  conferences  have  been  held  and  have  had  much 
to  do  with  the  crystallizing  of  such  ideas  as  are  repre- 
sented in  the  British  Labor  party's  program.  Leaders 
of  that  party  have  made  strenuous  efforts  to  secure 
contact  with  the  Russian  revolutionists.  After  the 
Bolshevik  revolution  of  November,  191 7,  the  Allied 
governments  steadily  disapproved  such  contacts.  On 
the  urgent  request  of  Mr.  Arthur  Henderson,  Premier 
Lloyd  George  consented  to  send  the  Labor  radical, 
Ramsay  MacDonald,  to  interpret  Allied  war  aims  to 
Russian  revolutionists.  However,  Mr.  Havelock  Wil- 
son, of  the  Seaman's  Union,  vetoed  the  order  of  the 
Prime  Minister  by  declaring  that  not  a  ship  would  be 
manned  to  carry  Ramsay  McDonald  on  this  mission. 

A  higher  patriotism 

The  British  Labor  party  has  become  a  repository 
of  international  spirit  during  the  War.  At  the  Not- 
tingham meeting  of  the  party  in  January,  1918,  not- 
withstanding a  very  genuine  devotion  to  the  national 
war  aims,  the  conference  opened  with  the  lusty  sing- 


60        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

ing  of  "The  Red  Flag."  An  American  correspondent 
at  that  notable  meeting  says  that  there  was  no  falter- 
ing when  they  reached  the  lines: 

"Look  round — the  Frenchman  loves  its  blaze; 
The  sturdy  German  chants  its  praise; 
In  Moscow's  vaults  its  hymns  are  sung 
Chicago  swells  its  surging  song." 

He  remarks  sententiously  that  it  was  like  the  con- 
vention of  our  National  Progressive  party  in  1912 
singing  "Onward,  Christian  Soldiers" — save  that  the 
Britons  knew  the  words.  The  average  American,  trade 
unionist  or  not,  would  have  supposed  that  the  assem- 
bly had  -gone  mad  and  was  shouting  for  "Bolshevism." 

At  this  meeting  Ramsay  MacDonald  said  to  his 
colleagues:  "See  us  here,  shoulder  to  shoulder;  dis- 
agreeing; comrades  in  our  disagreements.  And  when 
you  think  that  the  extension  to  this  table  by  a  few 
feet,  the  addition  to  these  chairs  by  half  a  dozen,  is  all 
that  it  means  to  bring  the  International  together,  in 
the  name  of  God,  let  us  think  of  this." 

Mr.  Gompers,  whom  the  American  Government  has 
recognized  as  the  exclusive  representative  of  American 
labor  during  the  War,  has  supported  the  most  rigid 
adherence  in  Allied  countries  to  this  policy  of  "no 
communication  with  the  enemy" — the  "enemy"  in- 
cluding not  only  the  Central  Powers,  but  Bolshevik 
Russia  as  well. 

The  Berne  conferences 

In  February,  1919,  however,  an  international  labor 
conference  was  held  at  Berne,  Switzerland,  and  simul- 
taneously in  the  same  city  an  international  socialist 
conference.    These  meetings  were  noteworthy  in  the 


THE  POLITICAL  LABOR  MOVEMENT    6i 

fact  that  they  brought  together  for  the  first  time  rep- 
resentatives of  the  warring  nations.  The  labor  con- 
ference was  much  the  less  spectacular,  but  it  drafted 
a  proposed  labor  chart  for  recommendation  to  the 
Paris  Conference — a  document  much  more  thorough- 
going in  its  fifteen  provisions  than  the  one  already 
noticed,  which  was  finally  incorporated  in  the  Cove- 
nant. The  socialist  meeting,  which  Mr.  Gompers  and 
his  associates  and  the  Bolshevik  contingents  in  various 
countries  refused  to  recognize,  was  more  significant  for 
discussion  than  for  action.  The  conference  approved 
the  labor  charter  drawn  up  by  the  labor  conference, 
warmly  debated  "Bolshevism,"  and  mildly  condemned 
the  doctrine  of  proletarian  dictatorship,  passed  a  lib- 
eral League  of  Nations  resolution,  and  another  reso- 
lution vaguely  condemning  German  militarism.  The 
German  Majority  Socialists  who  had  steadily  sup- 
ported the  German  war  program  were  conspicuously 
out  of  touch  with  the  main  body  of  delegates.  "If  we 
had  met  at  Stockholm  two  years  ago,"  one  of  the  Ger- 
mans said  after  the  conference,  "the  German  revolu- 
tion might  have  come  in  January,  1918." 

A  "New  International" 

In  March,  1919,  there  met  in  Moscow  a  group  of 
left-wing  socialists  representing,  directly  or  indirectly, 
twenty-three  countries.  This  group  of  radicals,  hurl- 
ing a  second  "Communist  Manifesto"  at  the  capitalist 
world,  launched  a  "New  International,"  whose  corner- 
stone is  the  world  ideal  of  a  proletarian  dictatorship. 

In  one  form  or  another,  the  international  political 
labor  movement  is  sure  to  be  revived,  probably  with 
unprecedented  vitality  and  effectiveness. 


CHAPTER  IV 

DEMOCRATIZING   INDUSTRY 

In  its  investigation  of  industrial  unrest,  the  British 
Government  found  that  two  wars  were  going  on  in- 
stead of  one.  Whatever  the  intention  of  employers' 
or  of  labor  organizations,  the  interests  of  capital  and 
labor  were  in  practice  opposed  at  every  point.  The 
essential  difficulty  was  expressed  in  the  illuminating 
Memorandum  of  the  Garton  Foundation  in  these 
words : 

"The  explanation  of  the  comparative  failure  of  the 
employers'  associations  and  trade  unions  on  the 
constructive  side  of  the  industrial  problem  is  to  be 
found  in  their  strictly  sectional  and  defensive  origin 
and  outlook.  Regarding  themselves  as  entrusted 
with  the  interests  of  one  party  to  industry  and  not  of 
industry  itself,  they  have  paid  no  attention  to  the 
problems  and  difficulties  of  the  other  side,  and  they 
have  come  together  only  when  one  had  a  demand  to 
make  of  the  other  or  when  a  conflict  was  imminent. 
Thus  they  have  always  met  in  an  atmosphere  of 
antagonism,  and  their  negotiations  have  been  carried 
on  as  between  two  hostile  bodies." 

A  discredited  regime 

When  Winston  Churchill  became  minister  of  muni- 
tions, he  said  the  War  was  a  race  with  revolution. 
The  situation  has  been  well  described  by  Mr.  C.  G. 
Renold,  one  of  England's  most  enlightened  employers: 
"Industry  had  reached  a  deadlock,  a  cat-and-dog  fight 
between  capital  and  labor,  and  we  cannot  go  back  to  it. 


DEMOCRATIZING  INDUSTRY  63 

An  industrial  Armageddon  was  impending  ...  we 
should  have  it  pretty  badly  by  this  time  if  the  War 
had  not  come.  The  old  method  of  strengthening 
everything  on  both  sides  and  fighting  things  out  has 
just  about  reached  its  limit,  and  there  must  be  some 
way  found  to  get  out  of  the  difficulty.  Cooperation 
is  the  only  ultimate  solution  in  sight." 

A  plan  that  works 

Hans  Renold,  Limited,  in  Manchester,  is  among 
the  pioneers  in  democratic  experimentation.  We 
have  already  noticed  the  radical  shop  steward  move- 
ment which  broke  loose  in  the  Clyde  district  in  1916. 
That  particular  "movement"  is  exceptional  and 
radical.  The  leaders  are  young  "left  wing"  revolution- 
ists, who  are  frankly  seeking  to  overthrow  the  capital- 
ist system.  Their  activities  have  been  very  significant 
and  have  probably  been  a  chief  factor  in  driving  the 
Government  to  heroic  measures  in  dealing  with  labor 
unrest.  But  apart  from  its  more  radical  manifesta- 
tions, the  shop  steward  idea  is  a  basic  factor  in 
instigating  the  many  contemporaneous  experiments  in 
representative  government  for  industry.  The  Hans 
Renold  Company  has  been  working  out  the  problem 
through  a  period  of  years. 

To  avoid  ambiguity,  the  term  "shop  committee"  or 
"shop  stewards'  committee"  should  be  distinguished 
from  "works'  committee"  in  the  British  Government 
plan.  The  shop  steward  has  long  been  a  recognized 
minor  official  in  the  engineering  trades.  He  has 
stated  duties  as  the  union's  representative  in  the  shop. 
The  stewards  representing  the  various  crafts  in  a  shop 
may  become  a  shop  committee.     This  is  the  men's 


64        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

own  committee.  The  management  has  no  authority 
over  the  shop  stewards.  The  Whitley  plan  provides 
only  for  joint  committees  representing  management 
and  men.  Obviously  the  stewards  have  the  greater 
democratic  sanction  and  significance. 

Trying  the  workers'  way 

In  the  Renold  Company  a  welfare  committee  existed 
long  before  the  War.  Experience  under  the  munitions 
act  taught  Mr.  Renold,  as  it  did  many  employers, 
that  discipline  could  be  more  satisfactorily  left  to 
committees  of  employes  than  made  the  subject  of 
frequent  hearings  before  the  local  munitions  courts. 
The  idea  was  conceived  of  turning  to  account  the 
demonstrated  success  of  the  welfare  committee.  A 
workshop  committee  was  proposed,  to  be  composed 
of  elected  representatives  of  the  workers  and  represen- 
tatives of  the  management.  The  more  active  union 
men  in  the  skilled  trades  suspected  this  new  procedure 
and  forthwith  organized  a  shop  committee  on  the 
old  lines  and  asked  for  recognition.  It  was  granted 
in  all  friendliness  but  with  some  misgivings  on  the 
part  of  the  management,  which  now  had  two  com- 
mittees on  its  hands.  It  was  decided  that  the  shop 
stewards  should  have  jurisdiction  over  matters  with 
which  their  union  was  concerned — such  as  rates, 
agreements,  and  dilution — and  that  the  other  com- 
mittee should  represent  the  less  skilled  and  less  well 
organized — by  far  the  majority.  The  committee  that 
really  worked  well  was  the  men's  own  committee. 
There  is  a  steward  in  the  Hans  Renold  Works  for 
about  every  twenty-five  men.    Any  little  group  can 


DEMOCRATIZING  INDUSTRY  65 

have  a  steward  that  gets  together  and  elects  one. 
Of  the  gains  in  treating  with  these  committees  Mr. 
Renold  says:  "When  we  didn't  agree  with  the  com- 
mittee we  wanted  them  to  get  the  idea  that  we  were 
playing  fair,  and  it  was  worth  almost  any  amount  of 
time  spent  in  negotiation  to  get  that  feeling  estab- 
lished." 

A  psychological  gain 

The  formal  plan  for  works  committees  and  joint 
councils,  approved  by  the  Government,  is  not  dis- 
credited by  comparison  with  the  shop  stewards 
movement.  It  is  less  ambitious  in  democratic  method, 
and  promises  less  than  the  regime  of  the  Renold 
Company,  but  it  is  very  significant  nevertheless. 
Whenever  men  representing  widely  different  interests 
and  viewpoints  meet  together  for  friendly  conference, 
regardless  of  the  distribution  of  power,  the  psychologi- 
cal situation — which  is  perhaps  the  most  important — 
is  sure  to  be  modified  in  the  interest  of  peace,  justice, 
and  cooperation. 

In  America  about  200  industrial  establishments 
have  adopted  some  form  of  employes'  representation. 
This  movement  did  not  originate  in  war  experiences, 
but  it  has  been  greatly  stimulated  by  the  problems 
of  war  production  and  by  British  example.  There 
are  two  distinct  types  of  representative  government  in 
American  establishments:  one  in  which  all  dealings 
and  operating  agreements  are  between  the  company 
and  its  own  employes,  and  one  in  which  the  union, 
representing  the  employes,  enters  into  a  contract 
with  the  employer. 


66        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

T3rpes  of  bargaining 

The  first  type  has  been  called  non-union  collective 
bargaining.  It  is  not  necessarily  anti-union,  but 
organized  labor  is  never  satisfied  with  a  mode  of 
government  in  which  the  union  has  not  a  primary 
voice.  The  second  type  is  the  trade  agreement  to 
which  the  union  is  a  party. 

Mr.  John  D.  Rockefeller,  Jr.,  has  been  one  of  the 
pioneers  in  employes'  representation  of  the  non- 
union type.  Following  the  disastrous  strike  in  the 
Colorado  coal  fields  in  1914,  Mr.  Rockefeller  made 
an  extended  inquiry  into  the  causes  of  unrest.  Out  of 
his  studies  have  come  the  elaborate  representation 
plan  of  the  Colorado  Fuel  and  Iron  Company  and 
that  of  the  Standard  Oil  Company  of  New  Jersey. 
The  idea  underlying  these  and  all  similar  plans  is  that 
capital  and  labor  are  jointly  interested  in  every 
industrial  question,  and  that  this  common  interest 
should,  and  can,  dominate  the  situation  to  the  exclu- 
sion of  industrial  strife. 

The  Rockefeller  plan 

Mr.  Rockefeller's  plan  has  undoubted  merit  in  that 
it  recognizes:  (i)  the  primary  importance  of  the 
human  problems  of  industrial  management,  (2)  the 
claim  of  the  community  upon  industry  as  a  form  of 
service,  and  (3)  the  necessity  of  a  "constitution  for 
industry  stipulating  the  rights  of  employes  and  their 
guarantees  against  injustice."  Perhaps  the  least  that 
a  critic  of  the  plan,  from  the  labor  point  of  view,  might 
say  is  that  there  is  no  approach  to  self-government  in 
the  scheme.  All  committees  are  joint;  no  powers  are 
delegated.      Hiring    and    discharging    are    expressly 


DEMOCRATIZING  INDUSTRY  67 

delimited  spheres  for  company  action.  In  the  Stan- 
dard Oil  Company's  agreement  there  are  more  than  a 
score  of  specified  offenses  for  which  dismissal  may  be 
peremptory.  If  there  is  a  fundamental  fault  in  the 
industrial  theory  involved  in  this  system,  it  will 
doubtless  be  found  in  the  discrimination  between 
capital-labor  antagonisms  and  management-employe 
controversies.  No  doubt  the  locus  of  most  strife 
today  is  in  management.  Save  for  the  socialists, 
workmen  are  not  at  odds  with  the  stockholders,  a 
majority  of  whom  may  be  people  in  moderate  circum- 
stances. But  management  cannot  be  separated  from 
ownership,  because  it  almost  invariably  has  the 
owner's  consciousness  and  point  of  view.  An  indus- 
try might  be  run  wholly  by  people  in  the  company's 
pay,  with  the  directors  excluded,  and  yet  be  unre- 
sponsive to  the  wage-earners'  demands.  The  execu- 
tives can  usually  be  trusted  to  take  the  stockholders' 
view  of  any  question  raised. 

♦'Directors  of  personnel" 

This  one-sidedness  in  control,  however,  is  in  a 
measure  offset  by  a  new  development  in  labor  policy, 
namely  the  appearance  of  the  employment  manager, 
"director  of  personnel,"  or,  as  in  the  Colorado  plan, 
the  "president's  industrial  representative" — an  official 
whose  sphere  of  responsibility  is  the  human  relations 
which  industry  involves.  To  be  effectual,  this  type 
of  management  demands  training  in  psychology  and 
ethics.  Already  labor  management  is  coming  to  be  a 
discipline  in  our  higher  schools.  But  unless  the  aim  is 
genuine  democracy,  the  ofhcial  will  affect  nothing 
but  the  pay  roll. 


68        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

The  Leitch  plan 

A  combination  of  scientific  management  with  a 
representative  system  of  control  has  been  worked  out 
by  Mr.  John  Leitch,  a  director  of  industrial  personnel. 
The  plan,  which  he  calls  "industrial  democracy,"^ 
also  a  non-union  type,  is  patterned  upon  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  United  States,  with  some  modifications. 
The  higher  executives  are  the  Cabinet,  the  lower 
officials  the  Senate,  and  the  employes'  representatives 
the  House.  The  Cabinet  is  a  party  to  legislation, 
however.  The  plan  has  produced  remarkable  results 
in  morale,  esprit  de  corps,  and  increased  production. 
The  increased  profits  are  shared.  But  there  is  room 
for  grave  doubt  whether  our  political  system  of 
representation  is  applicable  to  industry  in  any 
thoroughgoing  way. 

The  trade  agreement 

Coming  to  the  second,  or  union,  type  of  bargaining, 
it  appears  that  employers  who  deal  with  labor  through 
the  unions  may  have  much  or  little  democracy  in 
their  industrial  relations.  As  illustrated  in  the  case  of 
the  insurrectionary  shop  stewards  in  Great  Britian, 
union  machinery  may  operate  as  a  steam  roller,  the 
employers  furnishing  the  motive  power.  The  em- 
ployes themselves  may  be  disregarded.  On  the  other 
hand,  as  in  the  agreements  obtaining  in  the  garment 
industries,  the  employes  may  be  directly  represented. 
The  chief  problem  seems  to  be  to  keep  the  union 
sufficiently  in  command  of  the  situation  to  insure  to 
every  grouD  of  workers  the  necessary  generalship  and 


i"Man  to  Man,"  by  John  Leitch,  New  York,  1919. 


DEMOCRATIZING  INDUSTRY  69 

organized  support,  and  at  the  same  time  to  provide 
for  definite  participation  in  the  business  of  industrial 
management  by  the  rank  and  file. 

The  Hart,  Schaffner,  and  Marx  agreement  with  the 
Amalgamated  Clothing  Workers  of  America  and  the 
agreement  obtaining  between  the  Dress  and  Waist 
Manufacturers'  Association  of  New  York  and  the 
International  Ladies'  Garment  Workers  are  illustra- 
tions of  the  genuine  sharing  of  control.  Hart,  Schaff- 
ner, and  Marx  have  in  their  establishment  a  trade 
board  for  the  settlement  of  disputes  composed  of  ten 
employes,  five  nominated  by  their  fellow-employes 
and  five  by  the  management,  and  presided  over  by 
an  impartial  chairman.  An  arbitration  board  of 
three  members — a  representative  of  the  employes,  one 
of  the  management,  and  an  impartial  chairman — 
has  final  power  on  appeals.  The  company  is  enthusias- 
tic over  the  reduction  of  friction  that  has  resulted 
from  the  agreement. 

The  history  of  the  women's  clothing  industries 
in  New  York  City  during  the  last  decade  is  likewise 
instructive  in  the  possibilities  of  a  true  sharing  of 
industrial  management.  Agreements  governing  wages, 
hours,  and  working  conditions  now  obtain  in  2,500 
establishments,  involving  95,000  workers.^ 

Where  the  workers  rule 

Oddly  enough,  in  order  to  describe  the  most  notable 
example  of  democratic  labor  policy  we  must  return 
to  the  non-union  type.  The  Filene  Store  in  Boston 
is  not  an  industrial  establishment,  and  its  problems  and 

2  See  U.  S.  Department  of  Labor  Monthly  Labor  Review,  Dec, 
1917,  pp.  19-39- 


70        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

personnel  are  not  at  all  typical  of  those  with  which 
labor  management  in  industry  has  to  deal.  Yet  this 
example  of  a  group  of  employes  virtually  running  the 
business  cannot  be  other  than  significant  for  industry. 
These  employes  nominate  four  of  the  eleven  directors, 
elect  an  arbitration  board  with  final  authority  in 
matters  of  discipline,  dismissal,  and  the  interpretation 
of  rules,  and  change  the  rules  and  the  wage  rates 
when  they  choose. 

This  is  pure  workers'  control.  Mr.  Filene  states 
that  the  employes  have  never  misused  their  powers 
and  that  every  liberal  feature  of  the  store's  labor 
policy  has  paid.^  The  employes  have  on  occasion 
evidenced  a  consciousness  of  trusteeship  in  the 
exercise  of  their  privileges. 

Labor  "rights" 

The  demand  of  organized  labor  for  democratic 
management  of  industry  takes  the  form  primarily 
of  insistence  on  the  right  of  collective  bargaining 
through  union  channels.  The  American  Federation 
of  Labor  has  called  for  legislation  making  it  a  criminal 
offense  for  employers  to  "interfere  with  or  hamper  the 
exercise  of  this  right."  The  reconstruction  program 
of  the  New  York  State  Federation  of  Labor  refers  to 
the  sharing  of  shop  management  as  a  right  that  must 
be  won  for  labor  at  all  costs;  it  is  taken  for  granted 
that  this  will  come  through  regular  trade  union 
bargaining.  Give  to  the  unions  the  right  to  organize 
freely  and  to  bargain  for  their  constituency  and  they 


3  System  Magazine,  December,  1918,  and  January,  1919 — 
Serial  article:  "Why  the  Employes  Run  Our  Business,"  by  Edward 
Filene. 


DEMOCRATIZING  INDUSTRY  71 

will   have  no  anxiety  over   the  realization  of  their 
ultimate  aims. 

Profit-sharing 

Much  is  said  of  profit-sharing  as  a  form  of  industrial 
democracy.  It  is  a  widely  used  expedient  for  giving 
the  employe  a  personal  interest  in  the  business. 
A  common  method  of  distributing  profits  is  to 
grant  stock  in  the  company  to  the  employes  in  accord 
with  a  stated  plan.  The  acquisition  of  stock  by  the 
workers  is  in  itself  a  stabilizing  factor,  and  when  it  is 
given  as  a  recognition  of  service  it  undoubtedly  has, 
in  general,  a  good  moral  efifect.  Some  industries  make 
the  sharing  of  profits  a  direct  reward  for  efficient  work; 
that  is,  increases  in  profits  beyond  a  certain  norm 
are  shared.  It  is  probable  that  the  attitude  of  labor 
toward  this  arrangement  would  be  more  friendly 
if  it  were  not  usually  contingent  upon  extraordinary 
effort  on  the  workers'  part.  Making  the  worker 
a  capitalist  on  a  small  scale  can  never  meet  his 
demands  as  worker.  As  a  stockholder  he  is — like  his 
brother  stockholders,  whether  rich  or  poor — relatively 
powerless  in  the  government  of  the  industry.  Mr. 
Sidney  Webb  has  said  that  profit-sharing  as  a  means 
of  realizing  the  demands  of  labor  is  a  thoroughly 
discredited  expedient.  For  America  this  is  perhaps 
not  wholly  true,  but  the  crux  of  the  industrial  situa- 
tion, here  as  well  as  abroad,  is  not  in  relative  wealth 
but  in  relative  power. 

It  is  commonly  charged  by  employers  that  work- 
men want  to  share  profits,  but  will  not  share  losses. 
Obviously  they  cannot  agree  to  meet  losses  by  a 
sacrifice  of  wages.     An  instructive  case  is  on  record. 


72        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

however,  in  which  the  employes  of  their  own  accord 
offered  to  rehnquish  annually  a  part  of  their  share 
in  the  profits,  in  order  to  create  a  sinking  fund  which 
should  guarantee  the  stockholders  against  loss. 

Progress  toward  peace 

The  general  verdict  seems  to  be  that  when  the 
employes  in  an  industry  are  well  satisfied,  the  man- 
agement and  the  stockholders  are  most  likely  to  be 
in  the  same  frame  of  mind.  There  is  no  definite 
limit  to  production  where  a  spirit  of  cooperation 
obtains.  But  industrial  management  is,  in  a  sense, 
what  social  workers  call  a  "case  problem."  Personnel 
in  industry  varies  so  widely  in  race,  language,  temper, 
and  endowment  that  one  cannot  successfully  dog- 
matize in  matters  of  policy.*  But  there  can  be  no 
doubt  that  progress  toward  industrial  peace  and  the 
development  of  industry  as  an  art  lie  in  the  direction 
of  greater  powers  and  responsibilities  for  the  workers. 


•For  a  description  of  typical  plans  of  joint  management  see 
a  little  handbook,  "The  Shop  Committee,"  by  William  L. 
Stoddard,  1 919. 


CHAPTER  V 

SYNDICALISM 

The  French  term  for  "labor  union"  is  "syndicat 
ouvrier."  Because  French  labor  has  been  characterized 
by  direct  industrial  action  more  than  by  reformist 
political  efforts,  "syndicalism"  has  come  to  be  a  general 
word  denoting  direct  action.  "Direct"  in  this  sense 
signifies  immediate  application  of  economic  power,  as 
in  the  labor  strike,  in  lieu  of  a  slower,  indirect  effort  to 
reform  a  situation  through  political  action.  French 
labor  has  always  been  more  idealistic,  and  hence  more 
revolutionary,  then  English  or  German  labor.  The 
French  Revolution  has  left  its  mark.  Yet  it  was  not 
in  France,  but  in  Russia,  that  the  storm  broke. 

The  Russian  Revolution 

In  March,  1917,  the  world  was  startled  by  the  sud- 
den overthrow  of  the  monarchist  government  in  Rus- 
sia, under  Czar  Nicholas  II.  The  event  was  surprising, 
not  because  it  was  wholly  unexpected  by  close  stu- 
dents of  the  revolutionary  movement  in  Russia,  but 
because  the  forces  which  had  been  at  work  since  the 
abortive  revolution  of  1905  operated  quietly  and  in  the 
dark,  and  few  supposed  that  the  crisis  would  be 
reached  so  early. 

For  ten  years  the  councils  or  "soviets"  which  had 
sprung  into  being  as  the  expression  of  the  working- 
class  mind,  maintained  clandestine  activities  in  the 
way  of  revolutionary  agitation  and  education.    When 


74        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

the  moment  arrived  for  a  proletarian  uprising,  sup- 
ported by  general  dissatisfaction  with  the  govern- 
ment's handling  of  the  War  and  severe  economic  suffer- 
ing, it  required  but  a  few  days  to  effect  a  complete 
transformation  in  the  government. 

The  economic  collapse  in  Russia  was  the  inevitable 
result  of  the  withdrawal,  at  the  outbreak  of  war,  of  the 
German  managers  of  Russian  industries.  The  country 
had  been  dominated  almost  entirely  by  Germany  on 
the  industrial  side,  and  the  enforced  retirement  of  its 
industrial  managers,  accompanied  by  an  absurdly 
undiscriminating  general  mobilization,  made  a  col- 
lapse inevitable.  The  great  Russian  revolution  was 
accomplished  so  quickly  and  easily  that  the  working 
class  itself  scarcely  realized  what  had  been  done. 

The  provisional  governments 

The  first  revolutionary  government  under  the  lead- 
ership of  Lvoff  and  Miliukov  was  only  partly  socialis- 
tic. It  was  controlled  by  the  Cadets,  as  the  constitu- 
tional democrats  in  the  Duma  were  called.  The  First 
Provisional  Government  collapsed  after  a  few  weeks 
and  the  Second  Provisional  Government  was  estab- 
lished under  the  leadership  of  Alexander  Kerensky. 
He  represented  the  Socialist  Revolutionist  Party  to 
which  Catherine  Breshkovskaya,  "the  Little  Grand- 
mother of  the  Revolution,"  belongs.  Kerensky  was 
able  to  keep  the  reins  of  government  for  several 
months,  during  which  he  vainly  sought  to  unify  the 
country  politically  and  to  establish  a  working  under- 
standing with  the  Allies.  It  cannot  be  doubted  that 
the  end  of  his  regime  was  hastened  by  the  lack  of 
Allied  support.    He  tried  to  rebuild  the  Russian  fronts 


SYNDICALISM  75 

which  had  collapsed,  but  insisted  that  all  political  and 
social  reform  should  be  carried  out  in  an  orderly  way 
by  a  constituent  assembly.  This  the  radical  ele- 
ments, supported  by  the  revolutionary  hopes  of  the 
suffering  people,  would  not  wait  for. 

The  Bolsheviki 

In  November,  191 7,  a  second  revolution  occurred  by 
which  the  reins  of  government  passed  to  a  party  now 
known  as  the  Bolsheviki.  This  group,  whose  name 
signifies  "majority,"  was  the  dominant  faction  of  the 
Social  Democratic  Labor  party.  It  was  also  known  as 
Maximalist,  since  it  stood  for  the  immediate  realiza- 
tion of  the  maximum  socialist  program.  The  Menshe- 
viki,  or  minority  of  the  party,  were  known  as  Mini- 
malists since  they  favored  the  slower  adoption  of 
socialist  principles.  The  Bolsheviki,  under  the  leader- 
ship of  Lenin,  a  man  of  noble  birth,  whose  true  name 
is  Vladimir  UlianofT,  and  Trotsky,  a  Russian  Jew, 
formerly  well  known  in  New  York,  whose  real  name  is 
Bronstein,  set  up  a  new  regime  on  a  fourfold  platform: 
"Immediate  peace,  the  land  for  the  peasants,  workers' 
control  of  industry,  all  power  to  Soviets." 

The  Soviets 

The  Soviets  were  already  established  in  the  cities, 
but  had  limited  power.  They  represent  an  industrial 
form  of  government  quite  different  from  that  indicated 
by  the  democratic  ideals  of  Europe  and  America,  yet 
purely  democratic  in  theory  and,  in  certain  respects 
evidently  efficient.  On  the  agricultural  side,  the 
soviet  has  its  roots  in  the  Russian  mir,  the  oldest 
democratic    institution    in    Russia.      Owing    to    the 


76        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

extended  mobilization,  a  form  of  soviet  was  also  de- 
signed for  the  soldiers;  thus  the  formula  became  cur- 
rent— "Soldiers',  Peasants',  and  Workmen's  Councils." 

The  population  of  Russia  is  estimated  as  eighty- 
four  per  cent  peasant,  nine  per  cent  industrial,  seven 
per  cent  (until  the  War)  bourgeois — that  is,  owners 
and  managers.  Of  this  seven  per  cent,  one  per  cent 
had  nearly  lOO  per  cent  of  industrial  management,  and 
as  already  stated,  was  almost  entirely  German.  The 
absence  of  a  middle  class  made  possible  the  setting  up 
of  a  working-class  government  such  as  would  scarcely 
be  conceivable  in  England  or  in  America. 

Since  the  War  began,  no  topic  of  general  interest 
has  been  subject  to  so  much  contradictory  statement 
and  so  much  prejudiced  discussion,  as  the  Bolshevik 
revolution  in  Russia.  There  is  no  doubt  that  the 
present  government,  officially  known  as  the  Russian 
Socialist  Federated  Soviet  Republic,  has  established  a 
form  of  government  which  is  quite  out  of  harmony 
with  prevailing  ideals  of  political  democracy.  Instead 
of  delegates  representing  territories  without  class 
cleavages,  the  Russian  Soviets,  graduated  all  the  way 
from  the  local  to  the  national  body,  are  composed  of 
representatives  chosen  by  the  various  industrial 
establishments  and  peasant  communities.  Lenin  once 
said  that  the  difference  between  Russia  and  America 
in  this  respect  is  that  in  America  industry  is  clandes- 
tinely represented  in  politics,  but  that  in  Russia  it  is 
represented  openly  and  by  design. 

The  Constituent  Assembly 

The  Constituent  Assembly  which  was  called  for  the 
purpose  of  framing  a  constitution  was  prorogued  by 


SYNDICALISM  77 

the  Bolshevik  government,  because  it  was  dominated 
by  a  group  of  moderates  who  were  out  of  harmony 
with  the  radical  movement.  This  act  of  the  govern- 
ment, on  its  face  a  violation  of  ordinary  democratic 
procedure,  brought  upon  the  Bolsheviki  the  condem- 
nation of  Europe  and  America.  Strangely  enough, 
however,  the  Assembly,  which  before  it  died  declared 
for  immediate  peace  and  for  the  distribution  of  the 
land,  passed  out  of  existence  apparently  without  pro- 
test and  without  its  loss  being  seriously  felt  by  the 
workers  themselves,  who  had  already  become  accus- 
tomed to  the  soviet  method  of  representation  and  of 
government.  Colonel  Raymond  Robins,  of  the  Ameri- 
can Red  Cross  Mission  to  Russia,  states  that  at  the 
time  when  he  was  seeking  cooperation  for  the  relief 
work  conducted  by  our  Government,  his  Kerensky 
credentials  availed  him  little,  but  that  whenever  he 
received  a  pledge  from  the  head  of  a  local  soviet,  he 
got  all  that  was  promised. 

Lenin's  appeal 

Colonel  Robins  has  thrown  much  light  on  the  sign- 
ing of  the  Brest-Litovsk  Treaty.  The  Second  Con- 
gress of  Soviets  was  held  in  session  for  two  days  while 
Lenin  waited  for  replies  to  his  appeals  to  England  and 
the  United  States.  He  had  offered  to  defy  Germany  if 
the  British  and  American  Governments  would  stand 
by  him.  Finally,  receiving  no  word  of  reply,  Lenin 
said  to  Robins,  "I  told  you  so,"  and  called  for  ratifica- 
tion. The  treaty  is  commonly  referred  to  in  Soviet 
Russia  as  "the  Peace  of  Tilsit." 

Lenin,  who  is  now  recognized  as  one  of  the  ablest 
men  in  Europe,  even  by  those  who  thoroughly  detest 


78        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

his  theories,  has  aimed  to  follow  a  scientific  socialist 
program,  even  to  establishing  what  Marx  called  the 
"dictatorship  of  the  proletariat."  This  has  resulted  in 
what  is  known  as  the  "red  terror."  The  Bolsheviki 
seem  to  have  been  entirely  averse  to  capital  punish- 
ment at  first,  but  later  deliberately  undertook  to  make 
away  with  those  whose  continued  opposition  they 
believed  would  be  fatal  to  their  aims.  The  extent  of 
the  "red  terror"  has  probably  been  exaggerated,  but 
bloodshed  has  been  abundant.  The  true  facts  will  not 
be  known  until  normal  international  relations  are  re- 
stored. The  declared  aim  of  the  dictatorship  of  the 
working  class  is  to  create  a  society  in  which  everyone 
shall  work  and  in  which  classes  shall,  therefore,  disap- 
pear. No  "bourgeois"  person — that  is,  no  one  who 
lives  in  whole  or  in  part  by  the  labor  of  another — is 
entitled  to  a  vote  in  Soviet  Russia. 

Bolsheviks  outside  Russia 

Thus  what  commenced  as  a  political  revolution  has 
become  a  complete  industrial  revolution  carried  out 
in  syndicalist  fashion.  Echoes  of  it  are  heard  in  many 
parts  of  the  world,  and  a  new  word,  "bolshevism"  has 
been  coined  to  denote  the  Russian  program  and 
method.  Apart  from  the  "red  terror,"  Russian  bolshe- 
vism has  a  definite  industrial  meaning — virtually  what 
our  American  I.  W.  W.  have  sought  to  bring  about  by 
direct  action.  Radicals  evidence  much  amusement — 
and  reasonably — at  the  general  use  of  the  term  "bol- 
shevism" as  a  damning  epithet.  The  speaker  of  a 
great  state  legislature  has  pronounced  a  minimum  wage 
bill  "bolshevik."  On  the  other  hand,  leaders  of  the 
radical    labor    movement    are    willing    to    own    the 


SYNDICALISM  79 

epithet.    "From  the  top  of  my  head  to  the  soles  of  my 
feet,"  says  Eugene  V.  Debs,  "I  am  a  Bolshevik." 

It  is  interesting  to  note  the  radical  groups  through- 
out the  world  which  Lenin,  considers  true  comrades  of 
the  Russian  revolutionists.  He  finds  confreres  in 
Germany  (the  Spartacides) ;  in  Czecho-Slovakia,  the 
Baltic  Provinces,  Poland,  and  the  Ukraine;  in  Nor- 
way, Sweden,  Denmark,  Holland,  and  Switzerland; 
in  all  the  larger  Allied  nations,  and  in  America.  Our 
own  groups  to  which  the  Russian  Communists  pay 
their  respects  are  the  followers  of  Debs  in  the  Socialist 
party,  the  Socialist  Labor  party,  the  I.  W.  W.,  and 
the  Workers'  International  Industrial  Union. 

The  Socialist  philosophy 

The  Marxian  philosophy  of  history  underlies  all 
strictly  working  class  programs.  It  is  known  as  eco- 
nomic determinism,  and  is  susceptible  of  both  mod- 
erate and  extreme  statement.  It  has  modified  the 
thinking  of  many  economists,  who  nevertheless  repu- 
diate it  as  an  exclusive  principle  for  interpreting 
events.  Obviously,  in  bold  statement,  the  doctrine  is 
materialistic  and  explains  ideals  as  mere  reflexes.  It 
has  ardent  devotees,  who  do  not  hesitate  to  explain  the 
most  sentimental  romance  by  reference  to  some  "eco- 
nomic determinant."  Party  socialism  has  suffered  much 
at  this  point  from  the  over-statement  of  a  very  impor- 
tant principle.  The  events  of  the  last  five  years  have 
rudely  shaken  socialism  out  of  its  dogmatic  slumbers. 

Economic  determinism 

This  has  taken  place  partly  because  of  the  conflict 
between  national  consciousness  and  class  conscious- 


8o        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

ness,  in  which  it  has  been  demonstrated  that  a  French 
proletarian  feels  himself  closer  to  the  capitalist  of  his 
own  blood  and  language  than  to  a  proletarian  brother 
who  happens  to  be  a  national  foe.  The  issue,  to  be 
sure,  has  demonstrated  nothing  as  to  the  ultimate 
merits  of  the  class  ideal,  but  it  has  shattered  the 
notion  that  in  their  present  state  the  working  people, 
or  any  other  people,  are  governed  wholly  by  an  eco- 
nomic determinant.  The  War  has  revealed  many 
underlying  economic  and  commercial  causes,  but  they 
have  operated  indirectly.  In  part,  also,  the  jar  which 
doctrinaire  socialism  has  experienced  during  the  War 
is  due  to  the  gradual  rise  of  a  philosophy  of  opportun- 
ist action.  The  theory  of  evolution  has  been  under- 
going a  change  represented  most  notably  by  the  writ- 
ings of  William  James  and  Henri  Bergson.  French 
syndicalism  has  received  a  considerable  impetus  from 
Bergson.  In  this  new  view  of  life  the  present  is  more 
important  than  the  past.  Every  moment  is  creative. 
Supreme  importance  is  placed  upon  the  human  will. 
This  philosophic  atmosphere  is  conducive  to  syndical- 
ism— that  is,  direct,  creative  action  in  the  field  of 
industry. 

The  I.  W.  W. 

The  Industrial  Workers  of  the  World  (I.  W.  W.) 
represent  syndicalism  in  its  pure  form  in  the  United 
States.  They  were  "bolshevists"  before  the  Bolsheviki 
appeared.  The  I.  W.  W.  adhere  to  industrial  labor 
organization  as  against  craft  organization,  because 
they  aim  at  class  consciousness  and  class  movement. 
Working-class  unity  is  not  furthered,  they  believe,  by 
organization  on  a  craft  basis,  in  which  groups  that 


SYNDICALISM  8i 

should  be  allied  are  severed  by  jurisdictional  dis- 
putes. They  also  hold  that  political  action  is  a  hin- 
drance rather  than  an  aid  to  their  industrial  ends.  The 
strike  is  their  chief  weapon  and  the  general  strike  is 
their  ultimate  aim.  They  object  not  only  to  the  poli- 
tical method,  but  to  the  ideals  of  a  political  state. 
However,  the  I,  W.  W.  seem  to  be  divided  now  on  the 
propriety  of  political  action.  William  D,  Haywood, 
the  leader  of  the  movement,  has  advised  his  followers 
to  vote  or  not  to  vote,  depending  on  the  circumstances. 
The  Russian  soviet  is  a  close  approximation  to  I.  W. 
W.  ideals. 

Labor's  Ishmaelites 

Because  of  its  efforts  to  organize  the  unskilled,  and 
because  of  the  extremely  unpopular  character  of  its 
doctrines  and  methods,  the  I.  W.  W,  is  an  Ishmaelite 
organization.  It  flourishes  in  the  logging  camps  of  the 
Pacific  coast  and  by  means  of  sporadic  strikes  in  indus- 
trial centers  which  have  large  foreign  populations. 
During  the  War  the  organization  has  suffered  great 
restraint  and  in  many  cases,  it  is  to  be  feared,  real  per- 
secution. It  is  almost  impossible  for  an  avowed  I.  W. 
W,  to  secure  any  semblance  of  justice.  His  profession 
is  considered  as  evidence  of  opposition  to  all  govern- 
ment and  order.  He  is  not,  however,  an  anarchist,  but 
an  industrial,  revolutionary  socialist.  He  considers 
that  his  is  the  true  type  of  socialism.  In  the  trial  of 
forty-three  members  of  the  I,  W,  W.  in  Sacramento  in 
1918  it  is  stated  on  good  authority  that  men  were  con- 
victed wholly  without  evidence  and  that  at  least  in 
one  case  no  charge  whatever  was  brought  against  the 
man  in  question;   he  was  simply  sentenced  with  the 


82        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

group  on  evidence  submitted  against  his  companions. 
It  Is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  the  I.  W.  W.  preach 
and  practice  violence  on  all  occasions.  The  doctrine 
of  "sabotage"  (French  "saboter,"  meaning  to  "skimp 
work")  Is  freely  taught,  and  sabotage  is  "limited  only 
by  the  ingenuity  of  the  person  who  practices  It."  It 
may  mean  the  destruction  of  machinery  or  buildings, 
and  It  may  mean  only  "Ca'canny" — loafing  on  the  job. 
It  is  the  worker's  way  of  retaliating  for  a  real  or 
fancied  offense. 

The  I.  W.  W.  consists  in  the  main  of  migratory 
workers.  Marriage  Is  discouraged  among  its  members, 
because  the  man  who  settles  down  acquires  inevitably 
a  "vested  interest"  In  things  as  they  are.  The  organi- 
zation has  its  headquarters  In  Chicago  and  publishes 
The  New  Solidarity.  Its  New  York  organ  is  The 
Rebel  Worker. 

Varieties  of  radicals 

An  offshoot  of  the  I.  W.  W.,  sometimes  calling  Itself 
the  "true  I.  W.  W."  is  known  as  the  Workers'  Interna- 
tional Industrial  Union.  Its  members  consider  them- 
selves followers  of  Daniel  DeLeon.  They  hold  the 
same  industrial  Ideals  as  the  other  organization,  but 
strongly  assert  the  necessity  of  political  action  as  well 
as  Industrial  action.  They  are  virtually  affiliated 
with  the  Socialist  Labor  Party,  which  is  now  little 
more  than  a  remnant.  Its  organ  is  The  Weekly 
People,  published  in  New  York. 

There  is  also  a  left-wing  movement  in  the  regular 
Socialist  party  whose  organ,  The  New  York  Com- 
munist, is  edited  by  John  Reed.  The  discrimination 
of  one  set  of  revolutionists  from  another  is  today 


SYNDICALISM  83 

merely  a  matter  of  recognizing  comparative  shades  of 
red. 

Foreign  syndicalist  movements 

Apart  from  Russia,  the  most  active  revolutionary 
propaganda  has,  of  course,  been  going  forward  in 
Germany  and  Hungary.  The  soviet  system  was  defi- 
nitely inaugurated  in  Hungary  and  the  followers  of  the 
younger  Liebknecht  and  Rosa  Luxemburg  in  Ger- 
many made  serious  trouble  for  the  present  socialist 
government  until  Liebknecht  was  assassinated.  The 
moral  prestige  which  Liebknecht  secured  because  of 
his  almost  solitary  opposition  to  the  War  made  him 
an  influential  figure  among  liberals  and  radicals 
throughout  the  world.  The  followers  of  Liebknecht 
were  known  as  the  "Spartacus"  group.  By  comparison 
with  them  the  Majority  Socialists  of  Germany,  desig- 
nated as  the  "Left"  before  the  War,  are  now  the 
"Right."  In  Bavaria,  whose  revolutionary  president, 
Kurt  Eisner,  was  later  assassinated,  the  Government, 
in  the  spring  of  1919,  was  turning  palaces  into  work- 
ing-class dwellings  and  arming  the  workers  against  a 
possible  counter-revolution. 

The  home  of  syndicalism,  the  French  Republic,  has 
since  the  War  been  under  effective  conservative  influ- 
ence. The  Confederation  Generate  du  Travail  (corre- 
sponding to  the  British  Trades  Union  Congress)  has 
been  a  strong  industrial,  class-conscious  organization 
and  has  had  little  affinity  with  the  Socialist  Party. 
Now,  the  party  is  swinging  toward  direct  action  and 
the  Confederation  seems  to  be  more  interested  in 
politics.  But  the  spell  of  military  victory  and  the 
Peace  Conference  has  fallen  over  French  labor  for  the 


84        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

time  being.  It  has  at  times  seemed  probable  that  a 
Bolshevist  coalition  would  be  effected,  including 
Russia,  Hungary,  and  Germany.  At  present,  how- 
ever, the  conservative  forces  seem  to  be  approaching 
dominance  in  Germany  and  Hungary. 

The  National  Giulds 

The  syndicalist  movement  in  England  has  taken  a 
peculiar  form.  The  temper  of  British  labor  has  never 
been  so  radical  and  explosive  as  that  of  the  French 
workers.  The  British  movement  is  represented  largely 
by  intellectuals,  and  much  of  its  energy  has  gone  into 
academic  discussion  and  political  theorizing.  It  is 
most  important  that  some  national  group  should  be  at 
work  on  labor  problems  from  this  angle. 

The  National  Guilds  Movement,  or  "Guild  Social- 
ism," stands  for  an  ideal  between  that  of  the  western 
democracies  and  that  of  Soviet  Russia.  As  outlined 
by  a  foremost  advocate  of  the  National  Guilds,  Mr.  G. 
D.  H.  Cole,^  Guild  Socialism  would  leave  the  political 
state  to  be  kept  intact  as  represented  by  a  political 
parliament.  This  parliament  is  to  give  expression  to 
the  people  as  consumers,  and  their  representation  will 
be,  as  at  present,  by  territory.  Production,  however, 
is  to  be  regulated  in  an  entirely  different  way.  Men 
and  women  as  producers  will  belong  to  appropriate 
guilds,  and  will  be  represented  in  a  National  Guild 
Congress,  which  is  a  near  equivalent  to  the  All-Russian 
Congress  of  Soviets.  A  judicial  body  somewhat 
analogous  to  the  United  States  Supreme  Court  is  to 
hold  the  balance  between  the  political  parliament  and 


1  "Self-Government  in  Industrj%"  by  G.  D.  H.  Cole,  1917. 


SYNDICALISM  85 

the  Guilds  Congress.  The  plan  calls  for  autonomy  in 
the  various  industries  and  its  ideal  and  goal  is  indus- 
trial democracy. 

The  organ  of  the  Guilds  Movement  is  The  New 
Age,  published  in  London,  and  a  considerable  literature 
is  being  developed.  The  Guild  ideal  is  held  by  many 
leaders  of  the  British  Labor  Movement  and  has 
awakened  interest  in  America. 

The  Plumb  Plan 

Although  not  distinctly  revolutionary^  the  plan  of 
the  Railway  Brotherhoods,  which  the  American  Fed- 
eration seems  ready  to  join  in  fighting  for,  is  essen- 
tially syndicalist,  after  the  National  Guild  model. 
It  calls  for  a  corporation  to  operate  the  roads,  whose 
only  capital  shall  be  operating  ability.  The  Govern- 
ment is  to  own  the  roads  and  the  board  of  directors 
is  to  be  chosen,  one-third  by  the  operating  force, 
one-third  by  the  appointed  officers  and  employes, 
and  one-third  by  the  President  of  the  United  States, 
with  the  approval  of  the  Senate.  The  employes  are 
to  share  the  earnings;  vested  interests  disappear. 

The  path  ahead 

The  industrial  civilized  world  today  presents  a 
varied  aspect.  There  is  little  place  for  the  doctrinaire 
and  the  dogmatist.  Movements  are  being  launched 
with  frank  recognition  on  the  part  of  their  leaders  that 
they  do  not  know  where  they  are  going.  It  is  pre- 
eminently an  age  of  social  and  industrial  experimenta- 
tion. Of  all  the  powerful  nations,  the  United  States  is 
doubtless  the  most  conservative  as  judged  by  the 


86 


THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 


temper  of  its  working  people  and  by  the  complexion  of 
its  labor  movements.  Yet  it  is  no  time  for  blind  oppo- 
sition to  inevitable  tendencies.  History  shows  that 
tide-stemming  is  quite  the  most  unprofitable  business 
that  can  be  indulged  in.  Where  we  shall  go,  we  can- 
not say,  but  it  will  doubtless  be  a  long  way  from  here. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  ETHICS  OF  INDUSTRY 

About  two  years  ago  a  group  of  British  Quaker  em- 
ployers came  together  to  ask  themselves  a  significant 
question:  "What  relation  is  there  between  the  fact 
that  we  are  employers  of  labor  and  the  fact  that  we 
are  Christian  men?"  As  the  implications  of  that 
question  unfolded  they  continued  their  conferences, 
determined  to  follow  the  logic  of  the  situation,  wher- 
ever it  might  lead.  Their  conclusions  are  striking  and 
important,  but  that  is  a  story  by  itself.  The  point  for 
emphasis  here  is  that  they  asked  the  question  and 
pressed  it. 

What  democracy  is  not 

The  ethical  phase  of  the  industrial  problem  may  be 
assumed  to  be  less  subject  to  experimentation  or  dis- 
pute than  questions  that  are  scientific  and  technical. 
We  do  not  know  just  what  we  mean  by  industrial 
democracy — we  do  not  know  precisely  what  democ- 
racy means  in  any  situation.  Yet  we  certainly  know 
some  things  that  democracy  is  not,  and  if  we  find  those 
things  in  industry,  we  are  clearly  obligated  to  do 
something.  It  is  easier  to  pronounce  things  wrong 
than  to  set  about  righting  them,  but  the  ethical  task 
often  consists  primarily  in  pronouncing  them  wrong. 

The  need  of  a  moral  judgment 

It  may  be  questioned  whether  the  safe  and  sane 
method  of  approach  to  social  problems — never  attack- 


88        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

ing  until  we  have  something  better  to  offer — is  not 
fundamentally  quite  erroneous.  It  would  seem  from 
the  history  of  reform,  as  well  as  of  revolution,  that 
new  forms  of  association  have  been  born  of  very  pres- 
ent and  unavoidable  emergencies.  The  judgment 
that  a  situation  is  impossible  is  a  precursor  to  the  dis- 
covery or  creation  of  an  alternative.  The  community 
will  in  the  end  listen  to  its  prophets.  Why  should  not 
our  idealists  in  pulpits,  editorial  rooms,  and  professors' 
chairs  bring  pressure  to  bear  upon  industry?  The 
knowledge  that  he  cannot  tell  the  industrial  manager 
just  what  to  do  should  never  deter  the  moralist.  The 
moral  duty  to  decide  between  right  and  wrong  is 
primary.  What  shall  be  done  about  it  is  a  subsequent 
inquiry.  It  is  the  business  of  the  industrial  technician 
to  devise  means  of  putting  industry  in  line  with  the 
moral  judgment  of  the  community. 

To  the  end  of  securing  a  clear  moral  judgment  on 
the  industrial  order  there  are  certain  definite  questions 
that  might  be  asked.  For  example,  what  is  the  net 
effect  of  our  industrial  system  upon  the  individual 
spirit?  Does  it  in  any  way  violate  what  all  would 
agree  to  be  the  minimum  claims  of  democracy,  namely, 
freedom  for  the  Individual  to  render  the  greatest  ser- 
vice of  which  he  is  capable?  Or  does  it  ask  and  accept 
only  a  small  part  of  what  he  might  give  if  his  spirit 
were  freer?  Does  our  present  order  put  a  premium  on 
the  most  social  impulses  of  employers  and  workers,  or 
upon  the  most  self-seeking  human  instincts?  Does 
the  statement,  commonly  heard  today,  that  labor  and 
capital  are  partners,  describe  a  present  condition  or 
express  a  wish? 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INDUSTRY  89 

Each  to  his  own  problem 

There  is  a  good  bit  of  serious  study  going  forward 
in  this  country,  but  perhaps  people  are  too  generally 
busy  studying  other  people's  problems.  Employers 
have  been  studying  their  employes  even  to  the  last 
details  of  their  household  affairs,  and  working-class 
sympathizers  are  assiduously  at  work  on  the  moral 
problems  of  the  employer.  In  the  past,  progress  has 
usually  followed  the  serious  attempts  of  people  to 
solve  their  own  problems.  The  consistent  gains  of  the 
trade  union  movement  have  come  about  in  just  that 
way.  What  would  happen  if  in  industrial  communities 
all  over  America  employers  who  profess  an  ethical  or 
a  religious  faith  should  sit  down  around  a  table  and  do 
what  the  British  Quakers  did? 

The  Quakers'  challenge 

The  conclusions  of  these  earnest  inquirers  are  highly 
illuminating.  They  refuse  to  hide  behind  the  obvious 
necessity  of  reforms  in  industry  which  are  beyond  the 
powers  of  a  single  group.  Christian  employers,  they 
hold,  should  work  for  the  alteration  of  the  present 
system  in  so  far  as  it  is  inconsistent  with  Christian 
principles,  but,  they  insist,  "in  the  meantime  we  can- 
not afford  to  neglect  the  urgent  needs  and  the  out- 
standing opportunities  which  confront  us  in  our  own 
factories."  It  would  be  hard  to  find  a  more  direct  and 
effectual  challenge  to  the  most  conservative  business 
mind  than  is  contained  in  the  searching  inquiry  of 
these  Quakers:  "For  most  of  us  does  not  our  business 
afford  us  the  greatest  opportunity  we  have  of  serving 
our  fellowmen,  and  have  we  yet  ever  fully  tested  the 


90        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

potentialities  of  the  present  system,  whatever  criti- 
cisms may  be  urged  against  it,  as  a  field  for  applied 
Christian  ethics?"  Even  more  pointed  is  their  recom- 
mendation to  all  employers  "to  consider  very  care- 
fully whether  their  style  of  living  and  personal  expen- 
diture are  restricted  to  what  is  needed  to  ensure  the 
efficient  performance  of  their  functions  in  society." 

American  Friends  have  not  been  behind  their  Brit- 
ish brothers  in  constructive  thinking  on  the  industrial 
problem.  The  Philadelphia  Yearly  Meeting  has  es- 
tablished an  active  Social  Order  Committee,  from 
which  issue  frequently  reports  and  pronouncements  of 
high  value.  A  "Message"  published  by  the  Committee 
in  191 8  called  for  a  "re-examination  of  the  Quaker 
testimony  for  simplicity  in  the  light  of  modern  con- 
ditions." Investors  are  asked  to  favor  "those  invest- 
ments that  have  a  social  motive,  even  if  returning  a 
low  rate  of  interest."  A  bulletin  issued  in  the  summer 
of  1919  gives  publicity  to  a  proposal  that  a  group  of 
investors  be  formed  who  will  finance  businesses,  at 
low  rates  of  return,  which  shall  be  organized  for  the  ex- 
press purpose  of  experimenting  in  the  interest  of  better 
industrial  conditions.    All  this  is  fundamental,  real. 

"Old  worlds  for  new" 

Mr.  Arthur  J.  Penty,  one  of  the  English  Guild  So- 
cialists, in  his  book,  "Old  Worlds  for  New,"  contends 
on  scientific  grounds  for  the  simplification  of  life  which 
the  Quakers  advocate  as  an  ethical  ideal.  The  road  to 
industrial  freedom,  he  believes,  leads  back  to  the  old 
craft  method  of  production,  and  away  from  the  quest 
of  efficiency  in  terms  of  quantity  and  speed  of  produc- 
tion.   Whether  or  not  the  future  will  bring  anything  of 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INDUSTRY  91 

this  sort  must  remain  an  open  question.  Human  de- 
mands increase  in  number  and  diversity  with  the  de- 
velopment of  science  and  art.  But  the  spirit  that 
prompts  Mr,  Penty's  call  for  renunciation  is  the  only 
spirit  that  will  make  possible  an  adequate  approach  to 
the  ethical  problems  of  industry. 

A  new  kind  of  expert 

In  these  pages  I  have  attempted  only  to  point  out 
certain  phases  of  the  industrial  situation  which  have 
ethical  significance.  The  industrial  problem  is  in  its 
larger  aspect,  everybody's  problem.  It  should  furnish 
the  subject  matter  of  much  of  our  educational  work, 
from  primary  school  to  college.  It  is  not  sufficient, 
though  essential,  that  experts  should  be  busy  in  the 
field  of  industrial  relations  from  both  the  employer's 
and  the  workman's  point  of  view.  We  must  have  a 
new  kind  of  expert,  one  whose  approach  to  the  prob- 
lem is  non-partisan — even  non-industrial,  in  the  first 
instance — but  simply  human.  The  prime  necessity  in 
industry  is  a  moral  judgment  upon  its  methods,  its 
ideals,  and  its  underlying  philosophy.  To  pronounce 
such  a  judgment  one  must  be  able  to  bring  to  bear 
ethical  fundamentals  upon  industrial  questions  and  to 
introduce  them  effectively  into  industrial  controversy. 
There  is  tremendous  force  in  a  moral  judgment  pro- 
nounced by  someone  highly  esteemed  in  the  ethical 
realm. 

It  was  with  this  fact  in  view  that  Professor  Albion 
W.  Small  called  upon  the  churches  of  the  country  to 
set  up  a  commission  for  the  study  of  industrial  dis- 
putes.^   The  primary  purpose  would  not  be  mediation, 

^American  Journal  of  Sociology,  March,  19 19. 


92        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

but  simply  the  impartial  presentation  of  facts  and  the 
pronouncement  of  moral  judgments.  The  commis- 
sion, I  take  it,  would  be  composed  of  men  whose  chief 
qualification  is  not  economic  training  or  industrial 
expertness,  but,  so  to  say,  ethical  expertness — men 
who  can  bring  to  bear  upon  industry,  unhampered  by 
industrial  or  economic  preconceptions,  the  authority  of 
conscience  as  disciplined  by  religion.  Is  not  this  pro- 
posal at  least  in  line  with  the  indications  of  the  present 
day?  There  is  a  gratifying  tendency  on  the  part  of 
theological  schools  to  introduce  courses  in  industrial 
problems,  but  the  movement  is  only  begun,  and  it 
lags.  There  is  a  field  for  research,  unparalleled  by 
anything  which  the  schools  of  technology  are  doing. 

Industrial  peace-makers 

Furthermore,  it  is  doubtful  if  the  possibilities  of 
mediation  in  industrial  conflicts  have  been  more  than 
guessed  at.  Employers  are  increasingly  aware  of  the 
importance  of  human  relations.  Hart,  Schafifner,  and 
Marx  of  Chicago  testify,  as  a  result  of  experience  with 
one  of  the  most  radical  labor  groups  in  America,  that 
a  mutual  facing  of  facts  and  an  exchange  of  viewpoints 
can  solve  almost  all  the  problems  that  are  arising  in 
our  industrial  life.  There  are  in  every  community 
persons  whose  vocational  activities  are  directed  pre- 
cisely toward  this  end  of  promoting  understanding  and 
sympathy  between  man  and  man.  Cases  are  not 
wanting  where  serious  obstacles  to  industrial  peace 
have  been  overcome  by  the  efforts  of  those  whose  rela- 
tion to  the  matter  was  not  economic,  industrial,  or 
financial,  but  ethical.  Conciliation  is  always  better 
than  arbitration.     Labor  welcomes  mediators  more 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INDUSTRY  93 

than  arbiters.  At  present  the  isolation  between  most 
moraUsts — whether  teachers,  preachers,  or  writers — 
and  modern  industry  could  hardly  be  more  complete. 

"Americanization" 

It  must  be  remembered  that  labor  problems  in 
America  are  seriously  aggravated  by  the  presence 
here  of  vast  numbers  of  people  who  have  never 
become  well  acquainted  with  our  customs  or  methods, 
or  even  our  language.  The  human  problem  in  Ameri- 
can industry  is  proportionately  a  much  larger  concern 
than  in  European  countries.  For  this  reason  the  duty 
to  interpret  what  we  please  to  call  American  ideals  to 
immigrant  working  people  and,  conversely,  to  inter- 
pret their  minds  to  our  American  employers  and  gen- 
eral public,  is  an  outstanding  feature  of  the  ethical 
situation.  "Americanization,"  as  far  as  industry  is 
concerned,  has  not  been  an  altogether  beautiful 
process.  The  feeling  of  being  exploited,  the  persisting 
alien  consciousness  that  may  be  found  in  large  indus- 
trial populations,  is  deplorably  evident  in  times  of 
industrial  conflict. 

A  new  type  of  ministry 

In  this  connection  one  element  in  the  last  Lawrence 
strike  is  especially  noteworthy.  Three  ministers, 
whose  sympathies  were  aroused  by  stories  of  what  was 
occurring,  went  to  Lawrence  and  made  common  cause 
with  the  strikers.  They  took  their  professional  careers 
in  their  hands  and  incurred  suspicion  and  criticism. 
Quite  without  reference  to  the  merits  of  the  strike  or 
of  the  specific  part  played  in  it  by  the  three  clergymen, 
the  spectacle  of  ministers  of  religion  stepping  out  of 


94        THE  NEW  SPIRIT  IN  INDUSTRY 

their  conventional  surroundings  and  becoming  militant 
champions  of  what  they  believe  to  be  the  cause  of 
democracy  is  significant,  not  to  say  refreshing.  Groups 
of  immigrant  workers,  alienated  from  all  conventional 
forms  of  religion,  rallied  about  these  men  who  under- 
took to  live  their  life  and  to  fight  their  battles.  In 
times  of  stress  or  of  crisis  the  ministers  invariably 
counseled  moderation  and  the  use  of  moral,  instead  of 
physical,  force.  On  one  occasion  a  group  of  excited 
Italians,  enraged  by  what  they  considered  to  be  unfair- 
ness on  the  part  of  the  police,  were  shouting  wildly  for 
revenge.  The  young  minister  who  led  the  strike  said : 
"Yes,  we  must  fight,  but  this  is  the  way  we  will  fight," 
and  he  folded  his  arms  and  smiled.  The  counsel  for 
peaceable  methods  prevailed. 

Faith  and  practice 

The  notable  pronouncements  made  by  religious 
bodies  since  the  signing  of  the  armistice,  bearing  upon 
social  and  industrial  problems,  give  promise  that  the 
fundamentallyethical  character  of  such  problems  will  in 
the  future  receive  wider  recognition.  The  scholarlyand 
thorough  reportof  theArchbishops*  Fifth  Committee  of 
Inquiry,  representing  the  Church  of  England,  and  the 
courageous  examination  of  the  present  social  order 
made  in  this  country  by  the  National  Catholic  War 
Council  have  now  been  followed  by  a  critical  state- 
ment issuing  from  the  Commission  on  the  Church  and 
Social  Service  of  the  Federal  Council  of  the  Churches 
of  Christ  in  America.  A  good  beginning  has  been 
made.  If  the  principles  set  forth  in  these  pronounce- 
ments are  put  into  practice  by  those  who  promulgated 
them  something  approximating  a  sensation  will  be 


THE  ETHICS  OF  INDUSTRY  95 

experienced  in  the  industrial  world.  Not  all  who 
speak  the  word  will  do  the  deed,  but  there  is  unmis- 
takably an  increasing  company,  in  which  the  younger 
men  and  women  in  our  churches  and  schools  are 
largely  represented,  who  are  entering  with  the  spirit 
of  crusaders  upon  the  ethical  conquest  of  modern  life. 
It  is  upon  these  that  both  the  burden  and  the  hope  of 
the  future  rest.  No  amount  of  science  or  research  will 
take  the  place  of  a  will  to  realize  an  ethical  achieve- 
ment in  the  world  of  work.  If  we  speak  at  times  with 
a  note  of  certainty  as  to  the  future  it  is  because  we  are 
confident  that,  however  theories  may  fail  and  pro- 
grams prove  inadequate,  the  moral  will  of  humanity 
may  be  counted  on  to  bring  in  the  new  day. 


^ 


I 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 

Los  Angeles 

This  book  is  DUE  on  the  last  date  stamped  below. 


Form  L9-Series  4939 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 

AA    000  896  752    3 


^851 
J632n 


i 


